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Hijacking trucks filled to the brim with sensors sounds like a recipe for jail time. The logistics of stopping and looting a truck involves too many parties, a

Hijacking trucks filled to the brim with sensors sounds like a recipe for jail time. The logistics of stopping and looting a truck involves too many parties, and ensuring that each party is following enough security protocols to not be identified via face, vehicle, or gait will ensure that only a few small sophisticated heists will ever be successful.

yourapostasy 8y ago
> ...filled to the brim with sensors... Has someone actually worked out that tons of sensors will cost far less than people-driven trucks? As it is, fuel is the big cost, followed by driver salary [1]. L5 autonomous driving is not going to come cheap, that gear is going to price as close to 3X driver salary as they can get away with, on the assumption they can run close to around the clock. Whose margin is getting compressed for the additional sensor gear? This doesn't even touch upon that as soon as L5 is available and if 24x7 L5 operations approved, you suddenly just increased industry transport capacity 3X, leading to a sudden oversupply in certain segments and scenarios, while still requiring a certain baseline to handle peak load demands. That chaos will cause a lot of margin compression, and lots of rosy profit projections from L5 autonomous driving without drivers will turn into a race for finding more customer demand. I can see some modest sensor gear, but nothing fancy, and not a lot of them. Perhaps high resolution visual and night vision cameras coupled with lots of street camera access, with lots of back-end software processing will deter most theft attempts? We might ironically get to L5, only to stick lower-paid security guards on a random number of trucks. [1] https://www.thetruckersreport.com/infographics/cost-of-trucking/ https://www.thetruckersreport.com/infographics/cost-of-truck...
- jandrese 8y ago
  Sensor packages and near-AI compute clusters constantly get cheaper as the technology improves. Today it doesn't make sense, but in 10-15 years when a full self-driving solution costs maybe $1k? It's a no brainer, especially for long haul trucking. I'd guess that putting a security guard on a truck will be an exceptional occurrence, probably only used when the truck is hauling an especially valuable cargo or going through a known trouble spot.
  - ethbro 8y ago
    Given: (1) sensors necessary to autonomously navigate, (2) large stretches of rural America (out west, maybe 100+ miles to the nearest police station), (3) adaptable human adversay, (4) no humans to injure on the vehicle ... I just don't see how you economically protect a vehicle (vs cargo value). And more sensors simply mean more things to steal. The minimum law enforcement response time along your entire route is the real issue, and there's no way you decrease that short of drastically increasing police staffing.
    - jandrese 8y ago
      These thieves have to steal from a moving vehicle? Sure it's not impossible, but it's more Hollywood heist than something you'd see in real life. It will almost certainly happen a few times, but for practical purposes the amount of stuff stolen before the guys are caught will be less than what it costs to hire tens of thousands of rent-a-cops to sit in the backs of trucks. Plus, these are thieves we are talking about. Pointing a gun at a human driver and telling them to pull over so they can rob the truck is something that could easily happen today but is extremely rare. The minimum police response time is something that's hard to measure. It might be many minutes 90% of the time, but if you do 10 or 20 of these heists eventually you're going to get unlucky and the cop will happen to be sitting at a speed trap right there are you're busting into the truck. This is the fundamental problem with crime. You will get away with it most of the time, but when you don't you're fucked. It's a lousy career choice because the upsides are modest relatively speaking, and the downsides are huge. If you're going to be a criminal the trick is to steal enough to retire on and then immediately retire. Knocking over one random truck is not going to do it.
      - ethbro 8y ago
        You can get a 50 BMG rifle for a few thousand dollars and put a hole right through an engine block. Unload truck at your leisure. That's not even getting into ways to make an automated system stop by putting up an emergency / stop sign in the middle of the road. The risk to stealing is directly proportional to the chance of getting caught, which broadly correlates into something unexpected happening, which is drastically diminished by not having a human driver.
- elsonrodriguez 8y ago
  The average truck driver earns about $70k a year. Even assuming that the sensor suite costs as much as an entire Tesla Model S(which in addition to a sensor suite includes an actual car), the system will pay itself back in a year. Also once automated, the trucks can engage in all sorts of hyper-miling shenanigans since they don't have to worry much about traffic during a significant part of their 24/7 operation, especially on more remote roads. That's additional fuel savings.
a3n 8y ago
Anecdata: a fellow driver told me the story of a truck stopped at a light in "a bad part of town." Thieves rushed the back of the trailer, cut the lock and opened the door, just in case there was something worth grabbing. Another, parked overnight with a load of electronics at the southern boarder. He woke up and discovered the trailer had been broken in to. Yet it didn't seem anything was missing. Maybe something "extra" had been placed on the trailer before it crossed in from Mexico? In our company we're reminded when we'll travel through high theft areas. If we're pulling a trailer designated as "high value," wherever we are, we're not allowed to pick it up unless we have the fuel and legal hours to go at least 200 miles before we stop. My vague point is that every security move in history and to come can be defeated, if it's worth it to someone. And it's always with it, to someone. [BTW, it "feels" unlikely that a judge or jury would convict based on gait analysis.]
- bdhess 8y ago
  > BTW, it "feels" unlikely that a judge or jury would convict based on gait analysis. But it does seem plausible that gait analysis could lead to a suspect, who could be convicted (or more likely, plead out) on additional evidence discovered during an investigation.

yourapostasy 8y ago

> ...filled to the brim with sensors... Has someone actually worked out that tons of sensors will cost far less than people-driven trucks? As it is, fuel is the big cost, followed by driver salary [1]. L5 autonomous driving is not going to come cheap, that gear is going to price as close to 3X driver salary as they can get away with, on the assumption they can run close to around the clock. Whose margin is getting compressed for the additional sensor gear? This doesn't even touch upon that as soon as L5 is available and if 24x7 L5 operations approved, you suddenly just increased industry transport capacity 3X, leading to a sudden oversupply in certain segments and scenarios, while still requiring a certain baseline to handle peak load demands. That chaos will cause a lot of margin compression, and lots of rosy profit projections from L5 autonomous driving without drivers will turn into a race for finding more customer demand. I can see some modest sensor gear, but nothing fancy, and not a lot of them. Perhaps high resolution visual and night vision cameras coupled with lots of street camera access, with lots of back-end software processing will deter most theft attempts? We might ironically get to L5, only to stick lower-paid security guards on a random number of trucks. [1] https://www.thetruckersreport.com/infographics/cost-of-trucking/ https://www.thetruckersreport.com/infographics/cost-of-truck...

jandrese 8y ago
Sensor packages and near-AI compute clusters constantly get cheaper as the technology improves. Today it doesn't make sense, but in 10-15 years when a full self-driving solution costs maybe $1k? It's a no brainer, especially for long haul trucking. I'd guess that putting a security guard on a truck will be an exceptional occurrence, probably only used when the truck is hauling an especially valuable cargo or going through a known trouble spot.
- ethbro 8y ago
  Given: (1) sensors necessary to autonomously navigate, (2) large stretches of rural America (out west, maybe 100+ miles to the nearest police station), (3) adaptable human adversay, (4) no humans to injure on the vehicle ... I just don't see how you economically protect a vehicle (vs cargo value). And more sensors simply mean more things to steal. The minimum law enforcement response time along your entire route is the real issue, and there's no way you decrease that short of drastically increasing police staffing.
  - jandrese 8y ago
    These thieves have to steal from a moving vehicle? Sure it's not impossible, but it's more Hollywood heist than something you'd see in real life. It will almost certainly happen a few times, but for practical purposes the amount of stuff stolen before the guys are caught will be less than what it costs to hire tens of thousands of rent-a-cops to sit in the backs of trucks. Plus, these are thieves we are talking about. Pointing a gun at a human driver and telling them to pull over so they can rob the truck is something that could easily happen today but is extremely rare. The minimum police response time is something that's hard to measure. It might be many minutes 90% of the time, but if you do 10 or 20 of these heists eventually you're going to get unlucky and the cop will happen to be sitting at a speed trap right there are you're busting into the truck. This is the fundamental problem with crime. You will get away with it most of the time, but when you don't you're fucked. It's a lousy career choice because the upsides are modest relatively speaking, and the downsides are huge. If you're going to be a criminal the trick is to steal enough to retire on and then immediately retire. Knocking over one random truck is not going to do it.
    - ethbro 8y ago
      You can get a 50 BMG rifle for a few thousand dollars and put a hole right through an engine block. Unload truck at your leisure. That's not even getting into ways to make an automated system stop by putting up an emergency / stop sign in the middle of the road. The risk to stealing is directly proportional to the chance of getting caught, which broadly correlates into something unexpected happening, which is drastically diminished by not having a human driver.
elsonrodriguez 8y ago
The average truck driver earns about $70k a year. Even assuming that the sensor suite costs as much as an entire Tesla Model S(which in addition to a sensor suite includes an actual car), the system will pay itself back in a year. Also once automated, the trucks can engage in all sorts of hyper-miling shenanigans since they don't have to worry much about traffic during a significant part of their 24/7 operation, especially on more remote roads. That's additional fuel savings.

a3n 8y ago

Anecdata: a fellow driver told me the story of a truck stopped at a light in "a bad part of town." Thieves rushed the back of the trailer, cut the lock and opened the door, just in case there was something worth grabbing. Another, parked overnight with a load of electronics at the southern boarder. He woke up and discovered the trailer had been broken in to. Yet it didn't seem anything was missing. Maybe something "extra" had been placed on the trailer before it crossed in from Mexico? In our company we're reminded when we'll travel through high theft areas. If we're pulling a trailer designated as "high value," wherever we are, we're not allowed to pick it up unless we have the fuel and legal hours to go at least 200 miles before we stop. My vague point is that every security move in history and to come can be defeated, if it's worth it to someone. And it's always with it, to someone. [BTW, it "feels" unlikely that a judge or jury would convict based on gait analysis.]

bdhess 8y ago
> BTW, it "feels" unlikely that a judge or jury would convict based on gait analysis. But it does seem plausible that gait analysis could lead to a suspect, who could be convicted (or more likely, plead out) on additional evidence discovered during an investigation.