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Tesla Model 3 Vulnerability – Disable Autopilot Notifications, Speedometer, etc.
- FriedPickles 7y agoI don't believe that autopilot stopped functioning. In my experience autopilot functions fine even if the MCU crashes or reboots. And there's clearly an autopilot disengagement chime after the MCU freezes, probably caused by him manually disengaging autopilot.
- aloknnikhil 7y agoI think he corrects himself in the disclosure. > Important Note: I stated in the video that this disables the autopilot functionality, but that is incorrect. This will only disable the notification to place pressure on the wheel. If you keep pressure on the wheel, AP will continue to function.
- FriedPickles 7y agoThanks, makes sense. Almost all autopilot functionality is preserved during MCU problems. The attention warning indicator (pressure on steering wheel needed) being one notable exception, but that's pretty benign.
- Klathmon 7y agoNot only is autopilot functionality preserved, but there is a seperate speaker for alerts (like the "take over immediately" sound) as well for if the display MCU crashes.
- jaimex2 7y agoYep, get the clicks first then correct any click bait titles.
- aloknnikhil 7y agoSo how does the rollout for Tesla updates work? Are there specific updates that are marked mandatory before you can drive the car? Wondering how these disclosures are avoided from being exploited when not all of the cars have the patch.
- jmtame 7y agoThey’re not mandatory to drive. Tesla does silent over the air updates with important fixes since the car has data capabilities. Larger updates happen over WiFi.
- dbt00 7y agoThere's no mandatory updates that I've seen. You get an alert that there's an update, and it shows up every time you put the car in Park. It prompts you to update now or schedule a time. You usually have to be in range of wifi to download updates, afaik.
- nuzzl 7y agoHey, it's the guy from the video. I worked with Tesla on this and we waited until a sufficient amount of vehicles had the patch before releasing it out. But if someone that acts maliciously, just releases it out without co-ordination with Tesla, that's a different ballgame. I would imagine they would roll it out ASAP.
- natch 7y agoCars get eligibility for updates depending on when they were purchased, what hardware they have (including incremental revs that happen with newer versions of a model), what features they have that relate to the update, whether they have purchased the (future) full self driving add on, whether they are in the Early Access Program, and whether the customer has complained to service about a related issue that the update covers... those are the ones I know about. On top of this (or maybe under it) they have a layer with rollout tiers for Tesla owned cars, cars of employees who opt in for early updates, and customer cars. Probably more than just this. And then with all that they roll it out over time, so we're not all getting the update the same hour, but generally it starts with a trickle the first week and then becomes a flood of users getting a given update over the course of the following week or two. If you're not on WiFi you might get the "Update Available" notice in the UI first, and then when you get to WiFi it downloads it. But it doesn't wait, if you don't see that notice and it has WiFi, it just downloads it. Also Tesla says that if conditions warrant, it will download the update even when there is no WiFi. But I think it waits a while to try to opportunistically get on WiFi if it can, to reduce load on the LTE network it uses. If your car never connects to WiFi (which is up to you to do) then it will download, if it can, over LTE if the update is high enough priority. There are probably silent updates as well as another commenter indicated. Don't know about those but it makes sense.
- segfaultbuserr 7y agoThe car's low-level control is still functional as normal, it's just the user interface that crashes, disabling the main display, all readouts, and all notifications. Rebooting the UI can fix the problem (it will reset itself automatically after two minutes as well). So it's a security issue, but not that serious as the title may suggest otherwise. Still, apparently, a bad webpage with a loop of JavaScript that hangs the web browser can lead to a complete failure of the entire user interface, even disabling the speedometer, turn signal (only the notification, visual and sound, not the actual signal), and AutoPilot status. Still a red flag and not a sign of good engineering.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- TrumpMyGuns 7y agoBody panels with insane gaps and light housings that allow moisture in were already signs of bad engineering. Tesla is a joke propped up by social media fanboys.
- userbinator 7y agoIt's been joked a few times that a Tesla is a computer with a car attached. I guess things like this make that very obvious, and not in a good way.
- ChrisClark 7y agoThe very opposite actually. The computer crashes, but all car functions work perfectly, including autopilot (read the article update) and all safety features. So you take out the computer here and it's still a perfectly safe and drive-able car.
- userbinator 7y agoa perfectly safe and drive-able car ...with absolutely no instrumentation? Sure, the wheel and pedals still work, but everything else is not controllable. I've done some custom car stuff so I've had short drives without a dashboard, and while you could argue it's drivable, I wouldn't say safe.
- tyingq 7y agoI'm surprised browsing the web isn't a separate, isolated process from the car's general ui.
- Someone1234 7y agoSome vehicle systems use a VNC compatible client for this. Essentially put the "web parts" into their own system entirely, even physically, and then project the results into a window on the "safe part" UI. If something bad happens the VNC server might crash and client lose connection, but that's the limit of the danger. I know around the time Carplay became popular several auto manufacturers were pushing this idea as a Carplay/Android Auto alternative implementation: glorified VNC. But I guess the data wasn't "rich" enough for some parties.
- jacobush 7y agoOne vendor provides an HTML5 “frame”. Sounds questionable.
- NotSammyHagar 7y agoThere is a separate computer system. On the S the separate computer system for the drive train has its own screen (in front of the driver). On the 3 they use one display. you can separately reboot the non-drivetrain one.
- nickodell 7y agoHere's the vulnerability: <html> <script> var total = ""; for (var i = 0; i < 100000; i++) { total = total + i.toString(); history.pushState(0, 0, total); } </script> </html>
- root_axis 7y agoPretty funny. There's a joke in there about running javascript in your car.
- mister_hn 7y agoWhy do they allow JavaScript at all?
- speedgoose 7y agoThe car has a chromium based web browser. The web uses javascript.
- mister_hn 7y agobut it isn't a must. Just block it from executing it on a car
- fulafel 7y agoTerminology nit: the vulnerability is the improper process separation. That JS snippet is a PoC demonstrating the vulnerability.
- joeblau 7y agoThe MCU on my Model X has frozen a few times without visiting a website. I've had to forcefully restart my MCU at a stop sign twice since having it.
- tyfon 7y agoI've had the FSD computer (HW3) freeze in my X once. The autopilot/TACC, gps location and even the wipersn which are controlled by this even if you're not using auto-wipers (deep rain), stopped working. I had to stop and power off the car for a few minutes to make it work again. Everything else was fine though so I think they have isolated the driving itself quite well. I've also had the MCU crash 2-3 times but the two finger salute always fixes it. My car is 8 months old so these events are quite rare.
- boojums 7y agoI drive an old car that is missing a nice, modern infotainment systems, so my experience is out of date, but several crashes in 8 months seems pretty frequent? My expectation is that it would not happen at all.
- omgwtfbyobbq 7y agoIt is for an older infotainment system, but my sense is that it's normal for newer systems to have bugs. https://www.audiworld.com/forums/a4-b9-platform-discussion-212/mmi-freezing-anyone-else-2903641/page2/ https://www.audiworld.com/forums/a4-b9-platform-discussion-2...
- TheSpiceIsLife 7y ago“Normal” as in the normalization of deviance is defined as: The gradual process through which unacceptable practice or standards become acceptable.
- omgwtfbyobbq 7y ago
- aaomidi 7y agoMeh, the UI can also just crash on its own. You can restart the car (in the middle of the road, even) by holding the two on-wheel buttons. I've had to do that once before.
- natch 7y agoYes I think you know this but you made it sound pretty scary. For anyone reading, the car drives as normal, can still smoke pretty much any... let's not mention brands here, but suffice it to say, there's nothing to prove, and everything continues to work just fine. The UI comes back in a few seconds.
- aaomidi 7y agoWell, it is pretty scary. The UI crashing and you not knowing how to restart it is a big deal. It's not even like a traditional car where you can "restart" the electronics by turning it off and on again. It's a very specific sequence detailed in the manual...which most people aren't going to memorize.
- natch 7y agoIt sounds like you haven't had experience with doing a soft reboot. And yet, apparently you have, from your parent of parent comment... bizarre. You make it sound like some elaborate easter egg that's hard to remember and is only buried deep in the manual as a crazy special detailed long sequence of steps. It's neither some very mysterious sequence, nor hard to memorize, nor hard to learn about. And you don't even need to know it. As you well know it's just holding down two buttons which are right on the steering wheel basically where your thumbs are already resting as you drive. So why are you spreading FUD? You don't even need to take your eyes off the road. Not even for one second. The buttons are right there where you can feel them. And no, it's not something you could or would ever do accidentally unless you were trying odd stuff just to see what would happen. And if you did, it would be no big deal, and the car would continue driving just fine, and the UI would come back by itself after a few seconds. But again, this wouldn't happen. >It's a very specific sequence detailed in the manual... That is overly dramatic. Like, to the point where you should win an award. And the manual is not the only source for this "vErY sPeCiFiC sEqUEncE." It's one step: hold the two buttons for a few seconds. As you said yourself. In the unlikely even that A) a person driving the car doesn't know about this, B) they are running software that most cars don't have any more, C) they are using their web browser while driving, and D) they loaded a strange site that contained a hack, then they could just pull over and call for advice from service. Service would tell them to press the buttons for a few seconds, and they could be on their way in under a minute including the time for the phone call.
- jka 7y agoQuote highlight for any Tesla owners (and friends of Tesla owners) who may be concerned about this. "This issue is fixed in any release >= 2020.4.10." It looks like this release started rolling out mid-February 2020[0]. [0] - https://teslascope.com/teslapedia/software/2020.4.10 https://teslascope.com/teslapedia/software/2020.4.10
- natch 7y agoYes good to highlight that. Most of us are on 2020.10 or 2020.12 by now.
- chrisweekly 7y agoThose version numbers look way too similar to dates!!
- TheSwordsman 7y agoIt seems to generally follow the format of Year.Version.Patch.
- invisible 7y agoThey are in this format: Year.Week.Patch
- natch 7y agoWhat (user) invisible said. year.week or year.week.patch if there has been a patch. And there's a build number after that. We're on 4fbcc4b942a8, probably the prefix of a git hash I'm guessing. But then there's kind of a marketing version number as well, for which we are currently on v10.0 or v10. something: https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-v10-wide-release-mobile-app-update/ https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-v10-wide-release-mobile-app-... Those versions are more like the true major release versions, whereas the date versions are inside of that and are minor releases.
- chrisweekly 7y ago
- gnachman 7y agoI feel completely safe from this because the web browser literally doesn't work at all.
- etaioinshrdlu 7y agoThe Tesla dashboard should be predominantly a real time system. (It appears not to be.) Different features of the dashboard should be implemented as different services, ideally on different processors or different virtual processors. They should have fixed time sliced allocation. Limit the impact of one process interacting with another. The different processes should all send and receive visual/touch IO to a master display server. The master display server should be a hard real time system. I think we all know this is really how it should be done, it's just comical that Tesla says NO! and does it their own unsafe way. They don't treat the dashboard as safety critical. Despite that is where all essential warnings show up, in addition to the speedometer. You can easily lose access to all those while driving. I have multiple times witnessed the dashboard reboot for a few minutes while driving. I think the long term outcome is that Tesla mostly gets away with this, other car manufacturers attempt to copy their system with extremely poor results, dangerous failures result, and regulations are created. (Disclosure: M3 owner, grumpy engineer.)
- bumby 7y agoIt would be interesting to see how they categorize their systems as safety critical (or not). In my line of work, if it displays real time information to make safety critical decisions, it’s safety critical software
- etaioinshrdlu 7y agoWell that there is a problem with Tesla. They have that extreme secrecy culture. So no, you can’t see how they categorize it.
- URSpider94 7y agoMy interpretation is that they do not consider the infotainment display or associated processor to be safety-critical. All of the safety-critical stuff is in one or more separate processors that stay running if the dash computer crashes.
- bumby 7y ago
- knzhou 7y agoThis is the turning point, where I go from a technology lover to a nutcase who wraps everything in aluminum foil. At the minimum, anything that can browse the web but isn't a standard computer needs to be wrapped up.
- sliken 7y agoShrug, it's really no big deal. I have a Tesla Model 3 and never visited a website, nor plan to. It's a car, has games, maps, music, nav, etc. Can't think of a reason to visit a website. Sure you dig in and use the screen to type in a URL, pretty painful. There's no RSS Feed, news of the day, etc to tempt you into web viewing.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- fortran77 7y agoI'm surprised the budget "3" has this issue, and not the flagship model "S". You'd think the software would be nearly identical.
- rsynnott 7y agoYou have an extremely odd definition of the word 'budget'.
- castratikron 7y agoOkay. But remember when the infotainment system on Jeeps didn't have a firewall turned on and people could cut the brakes by spoofing a cell tower? https://www.theverge.com/2015/7/21/9009213/chrysler-uconnect-vulnerability-car-hijack https://www.theverge.com/2015/7/21/9009213/chrysler-uconnect...
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- keiferski 7y agoI've often wondered if Tesla 'bit off more than it can chew' by focusing on software, autopilot, and other things outside of the strict 'electric car' concept. Cool UIs and self-driving cars really have nothing to do with reducing emissions from fossil fuels. Personally, I would be more willing to buy a Tesla if it didn't have all of these software integrations and was simply a mechanical car with an electric engine.
- gok 7y agoA lot of what makes Tesla models more practical electric cars comes from the software. The UI whines at you when you charge the battery too much, which extends cell life. The navigation system prevents you from forgetting to charge along the route, mitigating range anxiety. The artificial throttle is also calibrated to improve efficiency.
- morsch 7y ago... shifting emissions from fossil fuels.
- smfendereski 7y agoso dangerous for electric car future development
- alasdair_ 7y agoI once managed to get my Tesla to slow down dangerously while on autopilot by having a friend hold a copy of a fake speed limit sign by the side of the road. I'd like to name this act "Tesla swatting". Next task: can I make the Tesla following me slow down or speed up by attaching a fake speed sign to the back of my car?
- bumby 7y agoThere is some real debate as to whether the “Tesla screen model” is appropriate for SpaceX’s Dragon capsule https://www.thedrive.com/news/22887/the-spacex-dragon-capsule-has-controls-like-a-tesla https://www.thedrive.com/news/22887/the-spacex-dragon-capsul...
- steeve 7y agoWhy is the speedometer and basic control UI not sandboxed from the rest of the GUI? Particularly the web browser?