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Ferrari is bricked during upgrade due to no mobile reception while underground

526 points by a5withtrrs 6y ago

sandworm101 6y ago
No sympathy. Park at 45* across two spaces, even astride smaller motorcycle-sized spots, and you have lost all rights to complain about anything.
- short_sells_poo 6y ago
  How do you know the person in question isn't renting both spots? And unfortunately renting two spots is often a requirement in Europe for example because the lot sizes tend to be so small that it is impossible to park with a wide car otherwise.
  - sandworm101 6y ago
    Those are full-sized spots. People with oversized vehicles and who rent spots normally park astrive the line, not across at 45. That is done by someone who doesn't want anyone near his car. And even if this guy has rented two spots, that is still being a jerk to all the other people who want to rent/use spots. Do that around my town and you will find motorcycles parked in the triangles you have left behind. I saw a porsche guy call the cops about this while at starbucks. The cop, on a motorcycle, decided to believe that the motorcycles had arrived first and that the porsche must have sneaked in between the bikes. The porsche was ticketed.
    - tashoecraft 6y ago
      It's probably for service, but if they are renting two spots I don't see a problem. When you have a nice car people find a way to always park next to you, even if you are the last spot in lot. People parking next to you is a guarantee of dings, dents and scratches which are going to be 10's of thousands to fix over time in a new Ferrari(). If they were allowed to get two spots, then I assume the lot has enough spots available so it's not an issue.
    - de_watcher 6y ago
      Motorcyclists are mostly jerks too because of the noise they make tho.
    - short_sells_poo 6y ago
      I observe no directionality pattern among people who rent two spots. Do you have a large sample set that you are extrapolating your assumptions from? I'm a person who rents multiple spots next to each other. And yes if the garage is willing to rent out multiple spots to me, I'll absolutely park however I like, generally in such a way as to prevent people from boxing me in. Unfortunately parking in Europe is a fairly scarce commodity and a "full sized parking lot" may be barely enough to tetris in a car like this, but you won't be able to open the door and get out. Certainly not without hitting the car parked next to you. We can get into the whole theoretical argument of why do people need a Ferrari or why should they be able to get more spots than people who can't buy a Ferrari and it just comes down to market economics. In so far as a person can afford 2 spots in a garage, I'm sure that most garages won't discriminate between clients. Nothing stops _you_ from renting out 2 spots and then you can park however you like. If you think that is fundamentally unfair, you should campaign for a policy that garages can only rent out one spot to one client. Maybe this particular Ferrari driver is an asshat and is taking up two spots while paying for only one. Those people exist. But you have zero information that it is the case here and are just jumping to conclusions because (and I'm jumping to conclusions here) you've been triggered by bad behavior in the past?
      - rjsw 6y ago
        I would guess that the most common medical condition for needing to use disabled spots is "can't park".
    - TimSchumann 6y ago
      Except if you read the thread this is clearly a privately owned garage used for auto parts installs, not public parking.
  - cosmotron 6y ago
    FWIW, it was confirmed that this was a bad parking job and was making things annoying for the employees. https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9jim1/update_theyve_flown_a_very_italian_sounding/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9ji...
  - rcostin2k2 6y ago
    According to an update on the same forum [1], the car stopped exactly in front of the warehouse's doors. And three hours ago, it was towed away, after the Ferrari technician flown from Sydney was not able to unlock the engine [2]. [1] https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9jim1/update_theyve_flown_a_very_italian_sounding/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9ji... [2] https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn...
- bikezen 6y ago
  > Dude comes straight from the dealership for a car-seat installation, but halfway through the car disables itself Presumably, the car is parked in some service spot(s) for a seat install...
  - quicklime 6y ago
    I imagine that for a car seat installation, parking at 45 degrees across two spaces is the right way to go. Otherwise you'd need three spaces to do the installation...
aloukissas 6y ago
Analog cars uber alles :)
- smitty1e 6y ago
  Serious question: I think there is a market for a dirt-simple, stripped down car like the original Jeep. If capitalism is so swift, why is the product I want to buy not on offer? Answer: the market is captured, and controlled via government regulation, by corporations that do not see individual owners wrenching on their cars as advantageous. Follow-up: how do we restore capitalism to our (nominally) free market?
  - lb1lf 6y ago
    -Because you need volume to make car production economic. We're a small and, hence, neglected minority. The product you want already exists, though - it is commonly referred to as the 70 series Land Cruiser. :)
  - AwaAwa 6y ago
    Crowd source a Build-Your-Own-Car model kit?
    - jagshsjddkdk 6y ago
      It's called wikispeed. Search for it.
  - sollewitt 6y ago
    Alternative answer: because the market for what you want is too small relative to the cost of producing the thing you want.
    - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
      Except that the cost of producing that is not actually high. Individuals have built cars out of parts in their own garage. You don't think there is anyone willing to make millions of dollars by producing a thousand of them for the thousand people who want them? But not if the fixed regulatory overhead is equal to the margin on twenty thousand cars.
1cvmask 6y ago
The bricking shows that all these “smart” cars with remote software control are liable to hacking (and potentially deadly accidents). We should have a choice to turn them off selectively. The worst part is that car companies don’t understand software and digital security. https://www.wired.com/2015/07/hackers-remotely-kill-jeep-highway/ https://www.wired.com/2015/07/hackers-remotely-kill-jeep-hig...
- 5h 6y ago
  Imagine doing that on a busy public highway for a wired.com article ... 'we did it in a safe way' They had no control over the cars behind, anything could have happened. Their attack could have been demonstrated on a parking lot or private road. Their information did need urgently sharing, and while I understand the common need for a bit for drama, this was utterly unsafe & for the good of everyone I hope they've pulled their heads out of their asses since making that video!
  - DoingIsLearning 6y ago
    Just for clarity because this Jeep example comes up quite often when talking about cars: I don't know any vehicle with connectivity (other than Jeep and maybe Ford?), which does not have safety critical CAN/FlexRay buses segregated from driver facing 'infotainment' systems. What that means is that the network bus in which your 'compromised' infotainment system is able to operate is completely separate from Engine, ABS, AEB, ESP, Airbags etc. The solutions vary but there is usually a physical gateway that prevents a passthrough MITM attacks, so you cannot simple send a message frame from your infotainment pretending to be an AEB module requesting emergency braking to your ABS system.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
- LeonM 6y ago
  > The bricking shows that all these “smart” cars with remote software control are liable to hacking No, it does not. The way I read the article, the photo is taken at the installation facility where (presumably aftermarket) seats were being installed. The car disabled itself during installation. It was not driving. It was also not "hacked" remotely. I assume the installer also had the key at hand. A certified dealership will have the computer interface and software to reset the anti-theft mode. For those that do not have this software, Ferrari can remote into the car and reset it for you. This requires connectivity though.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
schainks 6y ago
Couldn't some strategically placed cell repeaters solve the reception issue?
- notsuoh 6y ago
  Yeah, but I think the broader point I'd that a car shouldn't be disabled like this in the first place due to no reception.
  - LudwigNagasena 6y ago
    What’s the point of an anti-theft mechanism if it can be bypassed by turning off the Internet?
    - ddingus 6y ago
      Seems like insurance is safer.
  - bigwavedave 6y ago
    The car wasn't disabled because it lost reception, it was disabled because of an anti-tampering device that activated when the owner tried to install a child car seat (admittedly, what they did to install a child seat that set off the tamper switch baffles me). It remained disabled because the remote support team couldn't fix it since the parking garage was underground and had no cell reception.
    - coding_unit_1 6y ago
      The posts on reddit said it went into some uber-lockdown because it also didn't have reception so even adding cell or wifi repeaters wouldn't have worked. My guess is this some serious anti-theft for when your very expensive car gets stuffed in a shipping container - it bricks itself until you present it physically at a dealer (at which point you'd hope it gets flagged as stolen).
      - 6y ago
PJDK 6y ago
Reading through it seems like people are misinterpreting this. By my reading the car has an anti-theft device that was triggered by the installation of seats. There is a remote system to override the anti-theft device, but that doesn't work because it requires mobile reception. It's kind of funny, but this doesn't really tell you anything about the dangers of "smart cars" or anything.
- cm2187 6y ago
  So what happens if someone tries to steal a car in a cark park?
  - tlb 6y ago
    They can joyride around inside the parking garage as long as they like.
    - gruez 6y ago
      Or disable/jam the antenna and joyride indefinitely
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
    - LeonM 6y ago
      > They can joyride around inside the parking garage as long as they like. No, the car will be disabled due to the anti-theft system. The anti theft system doesn't need connectivity to work. It does need connectivity to be disabled remotely by Ferrari. However, that is never needed during normal operation. The owner of the Ferrari modified the car (after market seats, apparently), causing the anti-theft function to immobilize the car as a safety measure.
    - drawkbox 6y ago
      So Ferris Bueller could have never happened. Also, Ferrari's are useless in the apocalypse. I mean one benefit of the apocalypse is that maybe you could drive a Ferrari. Nope, they disable themselves when the grid goes down.
Constellarise 6y ago
Still better than their 2020 F1 car
LandR 6y ago
Ferrari used to make really beautiful cars but their modern stuff just does nothing for me. I don't think they will age well.
ceilingcorner 6y ago
Wonder if there will be a market for gasoline-powdered, or at least non-network connected, cars in the future. This sort of scenario makes me want to never buy an electric car, ever.
- jakemal 6y ago
  What does this have to do with a car being electric?
  - r00fus 6y ago
    Some nonsense due to commenter not having actually read the article - since the Ferrari in question has a gas engine.
- pwinnski 6y ago
  This is a gasoline-powered car we're talking about, so you've made quite a leap. I drive an all-electric car with no remote connections at all, unlike this gas-powered Ferrari.
  - ceilingcorner 6y ago
    Good point, I didn’t realize that. My assumption was that most electric cars going forward will have some unavoidable remote connections. Is there some reason why this is downvoted? Most electric cars seem to have remote connections...
- mprovost 6y ago
  There is still a market for horses.
  - jessaustin 6y ago
    Just barely. The slaughter ban enacted over a decade ago has emptied out horses from the American heartland. Lots of them starved to death. Many of them ended up slaughtered anyway, only in much poorer conditions in Mexico. Large livestock used to have inherent value in this country. Not anymore. We're the India of horses. When poor rural families are doing fine, spending thirty bucks a month on feeding and caring for a horse is no problem. But poor families know they won't be doing fine forever. They can't afford to spend $800 on a horse they don't know they'll be able to sell at all if they need to do so suddenly. So, lots of kids who would have spent time around horses absent the ban, haven't. Rich morons and the charities they support don't care about that. There are still markets in place for horses with economic value such as Thoroughbred race horses. Although, since they don't race their entire natural lives, Thoroughbreds have also been harmed by the slaughter ban.
bnycum 6y ago
The updates are pretty hilarious as well. Basically even after sending the tech the car is still bricked at the moment. Update 1: https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9jim1/update_theyve_flown_a_very_italian_sounding/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9ji... Update 2: https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn... There was also a story a few years back that is kinda similar in issue. A rental car was taken into a rural area but they couldn't restart the car as there was no cellular signal for the app to re-enable the car. https://twitter.com/kari_paul/status/1229214223227478016 https://twitter.com/kari_paul/status/1229214223227478016
- ljp_206 6y ago
  Haha, a few years back? That tweet about the stranded car is from February. I blame you zero percent for perceiving it as such though...
- netsharc 6y ago
  The tech shows up in another Ferrari. God damn, nice company car! Obviously a loaner because the tech flew in from another city, but damn! Edit: Oops, that's probably the tech in the bricked Ferrari, not in his company car.
- temp667 6y ago
  This car is not bricked. Please - get a grip on the language being used. The anti-theft device has triggered and the car is in lockdown.
  - Polylactic_acid 6y ago
    Is there a user control on the device to restore it? If not then it is bricked to that user. Bricked is relative to the users ability to fix it. At some level of skill and money nothing is "bricked" since you could replace or reflash anything.
    - 6y ago
LeonM 6y ago
A lot of readers here, and on Reddit seem to be misunderstanding the situation. The way I understand it, this car was taken in by a garage for 'seat installation'. I presume this means after market seats. The car disabled itself during installation. The OP assumed due to an anti-temper device, but it could have been any failure mode. Most modern cars with airbags will have sensors in the seats to disable some of the airbags if there is no passenger sitting there. So it is no surprise that any type of work on the seats puts this system in an error state. Especially on high-performance cars it is not unusual that the car immobilises itself when the safety systems are in error state. A certified dealership will have the computer interface and software to reset the fault mode. For those that do not have this software, Ferrari can remote into the car and reset it for you. This requires connectivity though. This is actually quite a common thing on luxury cars. This has nothing to do with 'smart' modes, remote hacking capability or disabling a car while in motion. The fact that the manufacturer can remote into their cars, does not automatically mean that the car is vulnerable to remote hacking. This is, in fact, a safety system that kicked in. The solution here was probably simple: bring the car outside, and let Ferrari do it's thing. Or trailer it to a certified dealership to have it reset there.
- lozaning 6y ago
  >The fact that the manufacturer can remote into their cars, does not automatically mean that the car is vulnerable to remote hacking If your car can connect to the internet it's vulnerable to hacking via the internet. My car, which is incapable of connecting to the internet suffers no such potential for abuse.
  - bdamm 6y ago
    Just because the car has external connectivity doesn't mean the car has abusable vulnerabilities. Of course, some vendors are going to be better than others when it comes to hardening, pen-testing, and good operational security.
    - mysterydip 6y ago
      Even if the only allowable connection is the legitimate manufacturer's, the manufacturer itself could be compromised one day (if not already), allowing malicious commands to be sent on the trusted downlink. Or an "oops I found a bug in the code you just pushed to 100,000 cars" could happen accodentally.
dialamac 6y ago
This is not bricking. And really has nothing to do with smart devices. I assume this device could be recovered through the usual wired diagnostic port means, so the reception issue is an annoying situation but not anything close to “bricking”
ajay-d 6y ago
Here are the updates https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9jim1/update_theyve_flown_a_very_italian_sounding/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9ji... https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn...
olivermarks 6y ago
This is such a vague reddit piece it's very hard to understand if the car is truly bricked or just needs to be towed to a place with signal. As a broader issue independent car repair garages are dying fast as more and more cars are manufactured with inaccessible DRM coupled with very expensive handshake hardware and software only dealers can own. This is a huge problem quite aside from the issue of what happens when a vehicle being driven can't phone home because of grid shut off etc (happening a lot in California for example), resulting in these types of incidents. I feel new vehicles should have owner ability to shut off all out and inbound electronic communication and still function satisfactorily. An earthquake or other natural disaster is going to immobilize a lot of vehicles in potentially obstructive places if we don't think this through.
- djpr 6y ago
  From the author of the thread, apparently no, towed to a place with a signal is not an option: "Oh yeah, so nope. The fact it had no signal at the time of the tamper safeguard being triggered meant that remote recovery wasn't an option, even when we moved it into the open. Idk, an extra layer of theft protection I suppose." https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/g8lbc9n/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn...
  - olivermarks 6y ago
    Would like to hear Ferrari's perspective on this. I already read the owner and various other commenters perceptions. I expect Ferrari have a dongle or similar to reset, although they probably wouldn't want to talk about specifics
- toyg 6y ago
  I really hope this was an optional anti-theft device that can be removed or disabled. Otherwise, what would happen if Ferrari went bankrupt and shut down their servers, or changed protocol, or whatever? Wonderful by-then-classic cars would become completely unsalvageable, which would be such a shame.
jacquesm 6y ago
The chances of attempted theft of a Ferrari are likely larger than the chances of someone installing a child seat so this looks like it was implemented ok, though the recovery could have been a bit more elegant.
yAak 6y ago
Mobile devs are smiling while reading this headline: always assume network loss or unavailability at any time time, especially the worst time possible!
dirtnugget 6y ago
Once drove a shared car into an underground garage with no reception. Cannot recommend it, had to pay the overnight parking and it took me quite some time to re-activate again.
TwoBit 6y ago
That's not what bricking means. Bricking means -permanent- disablement.
- bleepblorp 6y ago
  That's an overly pedantic definition of bricking. The car's in state where is is unusable without intervention from the manufacturer. There's no technical difference between this an a 'bricked' motherboard, cell phone, or other piece of consumer electronics: the hardware is not destroyed, but it's unusable unless the manufacturer is willing to fix it. The only difference between this bricked Ferrari and a phone bricked by a bad firmware update is that the Ferrari is worth enough that it's worth while for the manufacturer to fix it.
  - temp667 6y ago
    Keep on supporting the clickbait headline writers - for those of us around a bit longer we know what bricked means. And yes, actually bricking can happen, and no, it does not usually involve a quick and easy reset by a DEALER tech. If you want bricking, check out Samsung's work around the Note7. "prevent all U.S. Galaxy Note 7 devices from charging and will eliminate their ability to work as mobile devices" - that turns these devices into actual bricks with no future utility.
  - nomel 6y ago
    Since this is the intended operation of a tamper induced security lock, I think "locked out" is much more accurate than "bricked" (at least according to the reddit thread).
  - TwoBit 6y ago
    If establishing a connection to the manufacturer is all that's needed to restore the car (which was the case), there's no way that is bricking. That's like saying my Amazon Alexa is bricked when my wifi goes down.
bborud 6y ago
If you ever find yourself wanting a Ferrari, head over to your friendly neighborhood exotics workshop and have a look at the cars that come in. "Quality" isn't a word I'd use around a Ferrari.
- toyg 6y ago
  It’s not like McLarens et al have much of a rep on reliability either; that’s not the point of these cars. These cars are built to give you a fun ride for a few hours at the weekend (at best) or just to look good (at worst). Inbetween stints, they need lots of care. It’s like F1 cars: they’re built to go around very-well-maintained circuits a few weekends a year, but they wouldn’t survive two days on the average city street. If you want something that never gives you trouble, buy a VW or a Toyota. You’ll never see a garage if you don’t want to, but they will never give you the same experience as a supercar.
  - bborud 6y ago
    Actually, if you want a supercar that is engineered to more rigid standards, there is a factory about a 30 minute drive from the Ferrari factory in San Cesario sul Panaro that builds hypercars. And do drop by a garage that does exotics. Some of the things you will see there is really no excuse for. It is just terribly bad engineering. Don't make excuses for bad engineering, because at those prices and with that kind of customer service, there are none.
sytelus 6y ago
I don't understand why in 2020 we cannot have transactional firmware updates. Download firmware -> swap out. Is that so hard? This automatically allows for rollback to last known good as well.
dicroce 6y ago
I would phrase this differently. "Ferrari is bricked by poor software engineering & not handling a normal use case."
sabujp 6y ago
https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn...
dayjobpork 6y ago
So what happens if/when Ferrari stops supporting the remote hardware, or the mobile tech is no longer available (ie none of my 2g mobile network stuff works anymore because no telecoms company here does 2g anymore)
batt4good 6y ago
This has also been a problem with a number of ZipCar locations in Boston. I've actually come across ZipCars that have likely never been used because they're placed in underground garages with no cell reception.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

526 points by a5withtrrs 6y ago

No sympathy. Park at 45* across two spaces, even astride smaller motorcycle-sized spots, and you have lost all rights to complain about anything.

short_sells_poo 6y ago
How do you know the person in question isn't renting both spots? And unfortunately renting two spots is often a requirement in Europe for example because the lot sizes tend to be so small that it is impossible to park with a wide car otherwise.
- sandworm101 6y ago
  Those are full-sized spots. People with oversized vehicles and who rent spots normally park astrive the line, not across at 45. That is done by someone who doesn't want anyone near his car. And even if this guy has rented two spots, that is still being a jerk to all the other people who want to rent/use spots. Do that around my town and you will find motorcycles parked in the triangles you have left behind. I saw a porsche guy call the cops about this while at starbucks. The cop, on a motorcycle, decided to believe that the motorcycles had arrived first and that the porsche must have sneaked in between the bikes. The porsche was ticketed.
  - tashoecraft 6y ago
    It's probably for service, but if they are renting two spots I don't see a problem. When you have a nice car people find a way to always park next to you, even if you are the last spot in lot. People parking next to you is a guarantee of dings, dents and scratches which are going to be 10's of thousands to fix over time in a new Ferrari(). If they were allowed to get two spots, then I assume the lot has enough spots available so it's not an issue.
  - de_watcher 6y ago
    Motorcyclists are mostly jerks too because of the noise they make tho.
  - short_sells_poo 6y ago
    I observe no directionality pattern among people who rent two spots. Do you have a large sample set that you are extrapolating your assumptions from? I'm a person who rents multiple spots next to each other. And yes if the garage is willing to rent out multiple spots to me, I'll absolutely park however I like, generally in such a way as to prevent people from boxing me in. Unfortunately parking in Europe is a fairly scarce commodity and a "full sized parking lot" may be barely enough to tetris in a car like this, but you won't be able to open the door and get out. Certainly not without hitting the car parked next to you. We can get into the whole theoretical argument of why do people need a Ferrari or why should they be able to get more spots than people who can't buy a Ferrari and it just comes down to market economics. In so far as a person can afford 2 spots in a garage, I'm sure that most garages won't discriminate between clients. Nothing stops _you_ from renting out 2 spots and then you can park however you like. If you think that is fundamentally unfair, you should campaign for a policy that garages can only rent out one spot to one client. Maybe this particular Ferrari driver is an asshat and is taking up two spots while paying for only one. Those people exist. But you have zero information that it is the case here and are just jumping to conclusions because (and I'm jumping to conclusions here) you've been triggered by bad behavior in the past?
    - rjsw 6y ago
      I would guess that the most common medical condition for needing to use disabled spots is "can't park".
  - TimSchumann 6y ago
    Except if you read the thread this is clearly a privately owned garage used for auto parts installs, not public parking.
- cosmotron 6y ago
  FWIW, it was confirmed that this was a bad parking job and was making things annoying for the employees. https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9jim1/update_theyve_flown_a_very_italian_sounding/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9ji...
- rcostin2k2 6y ago
  According to an update on the same forum [1], the car stopped exactly in front of the warehouse's doors. And three hours ago, it was towed away, after the Ferrari technician flown from Sydney was not able to unlock the engine [2]. [1] https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9jim1/update_theyve_flown_a_very_italian_sounding/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9ji... [2] https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn...
bikezen 6y ago
> Dude comes straight from the dealership for a car-seat installation, but halfway through the car disables itself Presumably, the car is parked in some service spot(s) for a seat install...
- quicklime 6y ago
  I imagine that for a car seat installation, parking at 45 degrees across two spaces is the right way to go. Otherwise you'd need three spaces to do the installation...

aloukissas 6y ago

Analog cars uber alles :)

smitty1e 6y ago
Serious question: I think there is a market for a dirt-simple, stripped down car like the original Jeep. If capitalism is so swift, why is the product I want to buy not on offer? Answer: the market is captured, and controlled via government regulation, by corporations that do not see individual owners wrenching on their cars as advantageous. Follow-up: how do we restore capitalism to our (nominally) free market?
- lb1lf 6y ago
  -Because you need volume to make car production economic. We're a small and, hence, neglected minority. The product you want already exists, though - it is commonly referred to as the 70 series Land Cruiser. :)
- AwaAwa 6y ago
  Crowd source a Build-Your-Own-Car model kit?
  - jagshsjddkdk 6y ago
    It's called wikispeed. Search for it.
- sollewitt 6y ago
  Alternative answer: because the market for what you want is too small relative to the cost of producing the thing you want.
  - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
    Except that the cost of producing that is not actually high. Individuals have built cars out of parts in their own garage. You don't think there is anyone willing to make millions of dollars by producing a thousand of them for the thousand people who want them? But not if the fixed regulatory overhead is equal to the margin on twenty thousand cars.

1cvmask 6y ago

The bricking shows that all these “smart” cars with remote software control are liable to hacking (and potentially deadly accidents). We should have a choice to turn them off selectively. The worst part is that car companies don’t understand software and digital security. https://www.wired.com/2015/07/hackers-remotely-kill-jeep-highway/ https://www.wired.com/2015/07/hackers-remotely-kill-jeep-hig...

5h 6y ago
Imagine doing that on a busy public highway for a wired.com article ... 'we did it in a safe way' They had no control over the cars behind, anything could have happened. Their attack could have been demonstrated on a parking lot or private road. Their information did need urgently sharing, and while I understand the common need for a bit for drama, this was utterly unsafe & for the good of everyone I hope they've pulled their heads out of their asses since making that video!
- DoingIsLearning 6y ago
  Just for clarity because this Jeep example comes up quite often when talking about cars: I don't know any vehicle with connectivity (other than Jeep and maybe Ford?), which does not have safety critical CAN/FlexRay buses segregated from driver facing 'infotainment' systems. What that means is that the network bus in which your 'compromised' infotainment system is able to operate is completely separate from Engine, ABS, AEB, ESP, Airbags etc. The solutions vary but there is usually a physical gateway that prevents a passthrough MITM attacks, so you cannot simple send a message frame from your infotainment pretending to be an AEB module requesting emergency braking to your ABS system.
  - deleted 6y ago
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LeonM 6y ago
> The bricking shows that all these “smart” cars with remote software control are liable to hacking No, it does not. The way I read the article, the photo is taken at the installation facility where (presumably aftermarket) seats were being installed. The car disabled itself during installation. It was not driving. It was also not "hacked" remotely. I assume the installer also had the key at hand. A certified dealership will have the computer interface and software to reset the anti-theft mode. For those that do not have this software, Ferrari can remote into the car and reset it for you. This requires connectivity though.

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schainks 6y ago

Couldn't some strategically placed cell repeaters solve the reception issue?

notsuoh 6y ago
Yeah, but I think the broader point I'd that a car shouldn't be disabled like this in the first place due to no reception.
- LudwigNagasena 6y ago
  What’s the point of an anti-theft mechanism if it can be bypassed by turning off the Internet?
  - ddingus 6y ago
    Seems like insurance is safer.
- bigwavedave 6y ago
  The car wasn't disabled because it lost reception, it was disabled because of an anti-tampering device that activated when the owner tried to install a child car seat (admittedly, what they did to install a child seat that set off the tamper switch baffles me). It remained disabled because the remote support team couldn't fix it since the parking garage was underground and had no cell reception.
  - coding_unit_1 6y ago
    The posts on reddit said it went into some uber-lockdown because it also didn't have reception so even adding cell or wifi repeaters wouldn't have worked. My guess is this some serious anti-theft for when your very expensive car gets stuffed in a shipping container - it bricks itself until you present it physically at a dealer (at which point you'd hope it gets flagged as stolen).
    - 6y ago

PJDK 6y ago

Reading through it seems like people are misinterpreting this. By my reading the car has an anti-theft device that was triggered by the installation of seats. There is a remote system to override the anti-theft device, but that doesn't work because it requires mobile reception. It's kind of funny, but this doesn't really tell you anything about the dangers of "smart cars" or anything.

cm2187 6y ago
So what happens if someone tries to steal a car in a cark park?
- tlb 6y ago
  They can joyride around inside the parking garage as long as they like.
  - gruez 6y ago
    Or disable/jam the antenna and joyride indefinitely
    - deleted 6y ago
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  - LeonM 6y ago
    > They can joyride around inside the parking garage as long as they like. No, the car will be disabled due to the anti-theft system. The anti theft system doesn't need connectivity to work. It does need connectivity to be disabled remotely by Ferrari. However, that is never needed during normal operation. The owner of the Ferrari modified the car (after market seats, apparently), causing the anti-theft function to immobilize the car as a safety measure.
  - drawkbox 6y ago
    So Ferris Bueller could have never happened. Also, Ferrari's are useless in the apocalypse. I mean one benefit of the apocalypse is that maybe you could drive a Ferrari. Nope, they disable themselves when the grid goes down.

Constellarise 6y ago

Still better than their 2020 F1 car

LandR 6y ago

Ferrari used to make really beautiful cars but their modern stuff just does nothing for me. I don't think they will age well.

ceilingcorner 6y ago

Wonder if there will be a market for gasoline-powdered, or at least non-network connected, cars in the future. This sort of scenario makes me want to never buy an electric car, ever.

jakemal 6y ago
What does this have to do with a car being electric?
- r00fus 6y ago
  Some nonsense due to commenter not having actually read the article - since the Ferrari in question has a gas engine.
pwinnski 6y ago
This is a gasoline-powered car we're talking about, so you've made quite a leap. I drive an all-electric car with no remote connections at all, unlike this gas-powered Ferrari.
- ceilingcorner 6y ago
  Good point, I didn’t realize that. My assumption was that most electric cars going forward will have some unavoidable remote connections. Is there some reason why this is downvoted? Most electric cars seem to have remote connections...
mprovost 6y ago
There is still a market for horses.
- jessaustin 6y ago
  Just barely. The slaughter ban enacted over a decade ago has emptied out horses from the American heartland. Lots of them starved to death. Many of them ended up slaughtered anyway, only in much poorer conditions in Mexico. Large livestock used to have inherent value in this country. Not anymore. We're the India of horses. When poor rural families are doing fine, spending thirty bucks a month on feeding and caring for a horse is no problem. But poor families know they won't be doing fine forever. They can't afford to spend $800 on a horse they don't know they'll be able to sell at all if they need to do so suddenly. So, lots of kids who would have spent time around horses absent the ban, haven't. Rich morons and the charities they support don't care about that. There are still markets in place for horses with economic value such as Thoroughbred race horses. Although, since they don't race their entire natural lives, Thoroughbreds have also been harmed by the slaughter ban.

bnycum 6y ago

The updates are pretty hilarious as well. Basically even after sending the tech the car is still bricked at the moment. Update 1: https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9jim1/update_theyve_flown_a_very_italian_sounding/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9ji... Update 2: https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn... There was also a story a few years back that is kinda similar in issue. A rental car was taken into a rural area but they couldn't restart the car as there was no cellular signal for the app to re-enable the car. https://twitter.com/kari_paul/status/1229214223227478016 https://twitter.com/kari_paul/status/1229214223227478016

ljp_206 6y ago
Haha, a few years back? That tweet about the stranded car is from February. I blame you zero percent for perceiving it as such though...
netsharc 6y ago
The tech shows up in another Ferrari. God damn, nice company car! Obviously a loaner because the tech flew in from another city, but damn! Edit: Oops, that's probably the tech in the bricked Ferrari, not in his company car.
temp667 6y ago
This car is not bricked. Please - get a grip on the language being used. The anti-theft device has triggered and the car is in lockdown.
- Polylactic_acid 6y ago
  Is there a user control on the device to restore it? If not then it is bricked to that user. Bricked is relative to the users ability to fix it. At some level of skill and money nothing is "bricked" since you could replace or reflash anything.
  - 6y ago

LeonM 6y ago

A lot of readers here, and on Reddit seem to be misunderstanding the situation. The way I understand it, this car was taken in by a garage for 'seat installation'. I presume this means after market seats. The car disabled itself during installation. The OP assumed due to an anti-temper device, but it could have been any failure mode. Most modern cars with airbags will have sensors in the seats to disable some of the airbags if there is no passenger sitting there. So it is no surprise that any type of work on the seats puts this system in an error state. Especially on high-performance cars it is not unusual that the car immobilises itself when the safety systems are in error state. A certified dealership will have the computer interface and software to reset the fault mode. For those that do not have this software, Ferrari can remote into the car and reset it for you. This requires connectivity though. This is actually quite a common thing on luxury cars. This has nothing to do with 'smart' modes, remote hacking capability or disabling a car while in motion. The fact that the manufacturer can remote into their cars, does not automatically mean that the car is vulnerable to remote hacking. This is, in fact, a safety system that kicked in. The solution here was probably simple: bring the car outside, and let Ferrari do it's thing. Or trailer it to a certified dealership to have it reset there.

lozaning 6y ago
>The fact that the manufacturer can remote into their cars, does not automatically mean that the car is vulnerable to remote hacking If your car can connect to the internet it's vulnerable to hacking via the internet. My car, which is incapable of connecting to the internet suffers no such potential for abuse.
- bdamm 6y ago
  Just because the car has external connectivity doesn't mean the car has abusable vulnerabilities. Of course, some vendors are going to be better than others when it comes to hardening, pen-testing, and good operational security.
  - mysterydip 6y ago
    Even if the only allowable connection is the legitimate manufacturer's, the manufacturer itself could be compromised one day (if not already), allowing malicious commands to be sent on the trusted downlink. Or an "oops I found a bug in the code you just pushed to 100,000 cars" could happen accodentally.

dialamac 6y ago

This is not bricking. And really has nothing to do with smart devices. I assume this device could be recovered through the usual wired diagnostic port means, so the reception issue is an annoying situation but not anything close to “bricking”

ajay-d 6y ago

Here are the updates https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9jim1/update_theyve_flown_a_very_italian_sounding/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9ji... https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn...

olivermarks 6y ago

This is such a vague reddit piece it's very hard to understand if the car is truly bricked or just needs to be towed to a place with signal. As a broader issue independent car repair garages are dying fast as more and more cars are manufactured with inaccessible DRM coupled with very expensive handshake hardware and software only dealers can own. This is a huge problem quite aside from the issue of what happens when a vehicle being driven can't phone home because of grid shut off etc (happening a lot in California for example), resulting in these types of incidents. I feel new vehicles should have owner ability to shut off all out and inbound electronic communication and still function satisfactorily. An earthquake or other natural disaster is going to immobilize a lot of vehicles in potentially obstructive places if we don't think this through.

djpr 6y ago
From the author of the thread, apparently no, towed to a place with a signal is not an option: "Oh yeah, so nope. The fact it had no signal at the time of the tamper safeguard being triggered meant that remote recovery wasn't an option, even when we moved it into the open. Idk, an extra layer of theft protection I suppose." https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/g8lbc9n/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 https://www.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn...
- olivermarks 6y ago
  Would like to hear Ferrari's perspective on this. I already read the owner and various other commenters perceptions. I expect Ferrari have a dongle or similar to reset, although they probably wouldn't want to talk about specifics
toyg 6y ago
I really hope this was an optional anti-theft device that can be removed or disabled. Otherwise, what would happen if Ferrari went bankrupt and shut down their servers, or changed protocol, or whatever? Wonderful by-then-classic cars would become completely unsalvageable, which would be such a shame.

jacquesm 6y ago

The chances of attempted theft of a Ferrari are likely larger than the chances of someone installing a child seat so this looks like it was implemented ok, though the recovery could have been a bit more elegant.

yAak 6y ago

Mobile devs are smiling while reading this headline: always assume network loss or unavailability at any time time, especially the worst time possible!

dirtnugget 6y ago

Once drove a shared car into an underground garage with no reception. Cannot recommend it, had to pay the overnight parking and it took me quite some time to re-activate again.

TwoBit 6y ago

That's not what bricking means. Bricking means -permanent- disablement.

bleepblorp 6y ago
That's an overly pedantic definition of bricking. The car's in state where is is unusable without intervention from the manufacturer. There's no technical difference between this an a 'bricked' motherboard, cell phone, or other piece of consumer electronics: the hardware is not destroyed, but it's unusable unless the manufacturer is willing to fix it. The only difference between this bricked Ferrari and a phone bricked by a bad firmware update is that the Ferrari is worth enough that it's worth while for the manufacturer to fix it.
- temp667 6y ago
  Keep on supporting the clickbait headline writers - for those of us around a bit longer we know what bricked means. And yes, actually bricking can happen, and no, it does not usually involve a quick and easy reset by a DEALER tech. If you want bricking, check out Samsung's work around the Note7. "prevent all U.S. Galaxy Note 7 devices from charging and will eliminate their ability to work as mobile devices" - that turns these devices into actual bricks with no future utility.
- nomel 6y ago
  Since this is the intended operation of a tamper induced security lock, I think "locked out" is much more accurate than "bricked" (at least according to the reddit thread).
- TwoBit 6y ago
  If establishing a connection to the manufacturer is all that's needed to restore the car (which was the case), there's no way that is bricking. That's like saying my Amazon Alexa is bricked when my wifi goes down.

bborud 6y ago

If you ever find yourself wanting a Ferrari, head over to your friendly neighborhood exotics workshop and have a look at the cars that come in. "Quality" isn't a word I'd use around a Ferrari.

toyg 6y ago
It’s not like McLarens et al have much of a rep on reliability either; that’s not the point of these cars. These cars are built to give you a fun ride for a few hours at the weekend (at best) or just to look good (at worst). Inbetween stints, they need lots of care. It’s like F1 cars: they’re built to go around very-well-maintained circuits a few weekends a year, but they wouldn’t survive two days on the average city street. If you want something that never gives you trouble, buy a VW or a Toyota. You’ll never see a garage if you don’t want to, but they will never give you the same experience as a supercar.
- bborud 6y ago
  Actually, if you want a supercar that is engineered to more rigid standards, there is a factory about a 30 minute drive from the Ferrari factory in San Cesario sul Panaro that builds hypercars. And do drop by a garage that does exotics. Some of the things you will see there is really no excuse for. It is just terribly bad engineering. Don't make excuses for bad engineering, because at those prices and with that kind of customer service, there are none.

sytelus 6y ago

I don't understand why in 2020 we cannot have transactional firmware updates. Download firmware -> swap out. Is that so hard? This automatically allows for rollback to last known good as well.

dicroce 6y ago

I would phrase this differently. "Ferrari is bricked by poor software engineering & not handling a normal use case."

sabujp 6y ago

https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qnh3/final_update_and_there_it_goes_boys_a_true_marvel/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Justrolledintotheshop/comments/j9qn...

dayjobpork 6y ago

So what happens if/when Ferrari stops supporting the remote hardware, or the mobile tech is no longer available (ie none of my 2g mobile network stuff works anymore because no telecoms company here does 2g anymore)

batt4good 6y ago

This has also been a problem with a number of ZipCar locations in Boston. I've actually come across ZipCars that have likely never been used because they're placed in underground garages with no cell reception.

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