Jeep hack a red flag for industry - The Detroit News

Valasek, who helped catapult car hacking into the public eye when he and a partner revealed last year they had been able to control a 2010 Toyota Prius and 2010 Ford Escape by plugging into a port used by mechanics. Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV is vehemently opposed to hackers’ plans to reveal how they were able to wirelessly hijack a Jeep Cherokee — and potentially hundreds of thousands of other Fiat Chrysler vehicles. The apparent breakthrough is a major security issue not only for Fiat Chrysler, but all automakers. Car hacking has been demonstrated in controlled simulations in recent years — mostly when hackers are physically plugged into the vehicle’s hardware. But security researchers Chris Valasek and Charlie Miller recently remotely hacked into a 2014 Jeep Cherokee in a real-world test that included disabling the SUV’s engine functions and controlling interior features such as air conditioning, locks... “Their code is an automaker’s nightmare: software that lets hackers send commands through the Jeep’s entertainment system to its dashboard functions, steering, brakes and transmission, all from a laptop that may be across the country,” Greenberg... He reported that Miller, a former National Security Agency hacker, and Valasek, director of vehicle security research at the IOActive consultancy, have been sharing their research with Fiat Chrysler for nearly nine months, enabling the company to... Source: www.detroitnews.com