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> No malice be involved, just prudent reaction. It's not malice, it's panic and it's profoundly stupid. Only those with root access to the car can access the

by maratd 11y ago

> No malice be involved, just prudent reaction. It's not malice, it's panic and it's profoundly stupid. Only those with root access to the car can access the secret info. There are a handful of people out there who rooted their cars. They are individuals of extraordinary technical ability. You think they don't know how to make a backup? Or how to stop remote access? That's exactly what happened. He blocked them and then deleted the pending downgrade.

21 11y ago
Let's assume there is a problem caused be the rooting and as a result the Tesla spins out of control and kills a bystander. Would you agree that this extraordinary technical ability individual should be criminally liable in this case?
- maratd 11y ago
  > Would you agree that this extraordinary technical ability individual should be criminally liable in this case? No. Cars have had software for a while. Tesla is the FIRST and ONLY company to do over-the-air updates. I don't think you should be criminally liable for turning a feature off. Sorry, but once you push to production, the cat is out of the bag. I absolutely HATE this new attitude that it's OK to not thoroughly test code before pushing it to production, because hey, you can always fix it later or roll back, right?
- maratd 11y ago
  > Would you agree that this extraordinary technical ability individual should be criminally liable in this case? No. There's no mens rea. He should be liable for damages in civil court.
  - marme 11y ago
    there is if he is told the downgrade is for a critical safety bug that needs to be rolled back. Then he has shown criminal negligence for not allowing his car to be fixed
    - maratd 11y ago
      That's not what the OP said. He didn't say anything about downgrades. All he said was rooting and presumably, messing with the system. Neither qualifies as criminal negligence in my mind. I'm not sure I want to live in a society where gaining access to hardware I own gets me thrown in jail? I would also like to emphasize that this has never happened and is totally hypothetical.
      - 21 11y ago
        Gaining access to safety critical hardware is a questionable right. What if you are the owner of a building and you decide you want to "optimize" the fire detection/fighting system because you have some ideas in this area, or maybe you want to run an "open" software on it, with better reporting, and as a result some people die in a fire. Yes, is totally hypothetical, but you seem to be saying that one is not responsible if he does that, because he was just "hacking", with no mens rea.
        Dylan16807 11y ago
        >Gaining access to safety critical hardware is a questionable right. It happens every time I put more air in my tires.
        colejohnson66 11y ago
        (Serious question) But there's no law requiring tires to be able to be inflated by the consumer, is there?
  - 21 11y ago
    By this logic killing someone while driving drunk is also not criminal since there is no mens rea.
    - maratd 11y ago
      There is such a thing as criminal negligence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_negligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_negligence In your case, the person was being reckless. I don't think gaining access to hardware you own can be considered reckless, regardless of the unlikely circumstances that may result. Your death-by-rooting example is entirely hypothetical and has never happened.
      - 21 11y ago
        It hasn't happen only because the number of rooted smartcars so to speak is negligible compared to the total number of cars. Just like drone accidents, each year we get closer and closer to an actual kill as their number increases (https://youtu.be/MvF49R_ZX5E https://youtu.be/MvF49R_ZX5E). One day heavier drones will be required to run only certified software if flown over crowds, and rooting those drones will raise the same question.
      - vectorjohn 11y ago
        Absolutely it could be considered reckless. You think some guy messing with his car's firmware understands it well enough to be as safe as the manufacturer? If an accident caused by manufacturer firmware can make the manufacturer liable for an accident, then someone tampering with it obviously can make them liable. It has never happened? Who cares, what does that matter?
        maratd 11y ago
        I never said the hacker shouldn't be liable. I said he shouldn't be criminally liable. By your logic, if the manufacturer puts out software that is responsible for a death, would you throw the software developer who wrote in jail? That's silly. All this stuff is limited to civil liability.
- caf 11y ago
  This is in principle no different to people modifying their cars, which they've been doing for about as long as cars have been sold.
  - seanp2k2 11y ago
    Actually longer, since the first cars were the result of people modifying their horse carriages to not require horses :)
- vectorjohn 11y ago
  Yes, absolutely there should at least be the possibility of the owner being criminally liable. It's like if you drive with shit poorly strapped into the back of antruck and it falls off on the highway and kills someone. If it can be shown that the tampering caused the harm, it's really hard to argue there is no criminal liability.
  - jessaustin 11y ago
    One can envision various ways of showing that. Loading the custom firmware onto a different robocar, which then exhibits previously-unseen unsafe behavior related to the mishap in question, would be convincing. Unfortunately from this thread it seems clear that we'll just have some blowhard Tesla manager swearing that "our code is perfect and any change to our code would automatically cause vehicular Armageddon, never mind the fact that we change it on a regular basis!" They won't want me on the jury...

by maratd 11y ago

21 11y ago

Let's assume there is a problem caused be the rooting and as a result the Tesla spins out of control and kills a bystander. Would you agree that this extraordinary technical ability individual should be criminally liable in this case?

maratd 11y ago
> Would you agree that this extraordinary technical ability individual should be criminally liable in this case? No. Cars have had software for a while. Tesla is the FIRST and ONLY company to do over-the-air updates. I don't think you should be criminally liable for turning a feature off. Sorry, but once you push to production, the cat is out of the bag. I absolutely HATE this new attitude that it's OK to not thoroughly test code before pushing it to production, because hey, you can always fix it later or roll back, right?
maratd 11y ago
> Would you agree that this extraordinary technical ability individual should be criminally liable in this case? No. There's no mens rea. He should be liable for damages in civil court.
- marme 11y ago
  there is if he is told the downgrade is for a critical safety bug that needs to be rolled back. Then he has shown criminal negligence for not allowing his car to be fixed
  - maratd 11y ago
    That's not what the OP said. He didn't say anything about downgrades. All he said was rooting and presumably, messing with the system. Neither qualifies as criminal negligence in my mind. I'm not sure I want to live in a society where gaining access to hardware I own gets me thrown in jail? I would also like to emphasize that this has never happened and is totally hypothetical.
    - 21 11y ago
      Gaining access to safety critical hardware is a questionable right. What if you are the owner of a building and you decide you want to "optimize" the fire detection/fighting system because you have some ideas in this area, or maybe you want to run an "open" software on it, with better reporting, and as a result some people die in a fire. Yes, is totally hypothetical, but you seem to be saying that one is not responsible if he does that, because he was just "hacking", with no mens rea.
      - Dylan16807 11y ago
        >Gaining access to safety critical hardware is a questionable right. It happens every time I put more air in my tires.
        colejohnson66 11y ago
        (Serious question) But there's no law requiring tires to be able to be inflated by the consumer, is there?
- 21 11y ago
  By this logic killing someone while driving drunk is also not criminal since there is no mens rea.
  - maratd 11y ago
    There is such a thing as criminal negligence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_negligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_negligence In your case, the person was being reckless. I don't think gaining access to hardware you own can be considered reckless, regardless of the unlikely circumstances that may result. Your death-by-rooting example is entirely hypothetical and has never happened.
    - 21 11y ago
      It hasn't happen only because the number of rooted smartcars so to speak is negligible compared to the total number of cars. Just like drone accidents, each year we get closer and closer to an actual kill as their number increases (https://youtu.be/MvF49R_ZX5E https://youtu.be/MvF49R_ZX5E). One day heavier drones will be required to run only certified software if flown over crowds, and rooting those drones will raise the same question.
    - vectorjohn 11y ago
      Absolutely it could be considered reckless. You think some guy messing with his car's firmware understands it well enough to be as safe as the manufacturer? If an accident caused by manufacturer firmware can make the manufacturer liable for an accident, then someone tampering with it obviously can make them liable. It has never happened? Who cares, what does that matter?
      - maratd 11y ago
        I never said the hacker shouldn't be liable. I said he shouldn't be criminally liable. By your logic, if the manufacturer puts out software that is responsible for a death, would you throw the software developer who wrote in jail? That's silly. All this stuff is limited to civil liability.
caf 11y ago
This is in principle no different to people modifying their cars, which they've been doing for about as long as cars have been sold.
- seanp2k2 11y ago
  Actually longer, since the first cars were the result of people modifying their horse carriages to not require horses :)
vectorjohn 11y ago
Yes, absolutely there should at least be the possibility of the owner being criminally liable. It's like if you drive with shit poorly strapped into the back of antruck and it falls off on the highway and kills someone. If it can be shown that the tampering caused the harm, it's really hard to argue there is no criminal liability.
- jessaustin 11y ago
  One can envision various ways of showing that. Loading the custom firmware onto a different robocar, which then exhibits previously-unseen unsafe behavior related to the mishap in question, would be convincing. Unfortunately from this thread it seems clear that we'll just have some blowhard Tesla manager swearing that "our code is perfect and any change to our code would automatically cause vehicular Armageddon, never mind the fact that we change it on a regular basis!" They won't want me on the jury...