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> anyone questioning whether the dangers of cloud-enabling So let me get this straight ... They were able to plug in a laptop into the car and gain control. I

• Silhouette 11y ago
  Yes, the connected nature of the car is an attack vector. But it seems there are other attack vectors which are far worse and the connected nature can be used to protect the vehicle. We need to be careful with this kind of risk assessment. If Microsoft or Google messes up a Windows or Chrome update that is automatically installed, or a malicious actor compromises the update mechanism, maybe a few thousand PCs belonging to people who accepted the risk get broken and there will be some hassle restoring normal functionality afterwards. If a car manufacturer messes up a firmware over-the-air update that is automatically installed, or a malicious actor compromises the update mechanism, maybe a few thousand cars belonging to people who accepted the risk get run into walls at 100mph. It is far from clear that providing a mechanism for remotely initiated updates of fundamental system software is a win in this context. As we've seen with automatically updating PC software in recent years, not all updates work as intended, and as we've seen with modern malware, reprogrammable firmware is not always a blessing.