Entries Tagged "cars"

Page 18 of 19

New Risks of Automatic Speedtraps

Every security system brings about new threats. Here’s an example:

The RAC Foundation yesterday called for an urgent review of the first fixed motorway speed cameras.

Far from improving drivers’ behaviour, motorists are now bunching at high speeds between junctions 14-18 on the M4 in Wiltshire, said Edmund King, the foundation’s executive director.

The cameras were introduced by the Wiltshire and Swindon Safety Camera Partnership in an attempt to reduce accidents on a stretch of the motorway. But most motorists are now travelling at just under 79mph, the speed at which they face being fined.

In response to automated speedtraps, drivers are adopting the obvious tactic of driving just below the trigger speed for the cameras, presumably on cruise control. So instead of cars on the road traveling at a spectrum of speeds with reasonable gaps between them, we are seeing “pelotons” of cars traveling closely bunched together at the same high speed, presenting unfamiliar hazards to each other and to law-abiding slower road-users.

The result is that average speeds are going up, and not down.

Posted on April 25, 2005 at 3:12 PM • View Comments

Universal Automobile Surveillance

Universal automobile surveillance comes to the United Arab Emirates:

IBM will begin installing a “Smart Box” system in vehicles in the United Arab Emirates next year, potentially generating millions in traffic fines for the Gulf state. The UAE signed a $125 million contract with IBM today to provide the high-tech traffic monitoring and speed-enforcing system in which a GPS-enabled “Smart Box” would be installed in cars to provide a voice warning if the driver exceeds the local speed limit for wherever he may be driving. If the voice warning is ignored, the system would use a GSM/GPRS link to beam the car’s speed, identity and location to the police so that a ticket could be issued. The system would also track and monitor any other driving violations, including “reckless behavior.”

This kind of thing is also being implemented in the UK, for insurance purposes.

Posted on April 22, 2005 at 8:30 AM • View Comments

License-Plate Scanning by Helicopter

From TheNewspaper.com:

The fictional police spy helicopter from the movie Blue Thunder is taking a big step toward becoming a reality. Police in the UK have successfully tested a 160 MPH helicopter that can read license plates from as much as 2,000 feet in the air. The Eurocopter EC135 is equipped with a camera capable of scanning 5 cars every second. Essex Police Inspector Paul Moor told the Daily Star newspaper: “This is all about denying criminals the use of the road. Using a number plate recognition camera from the air means crooks will have nowhere to hide.”

The use of Automated Plate Number Recognition (ANPR) is growing. ANPR devices photograph vehicles and then use optical character recognition to extract license plate numbers and match them with any selected databases. The devices use infrared sensors to avoid the need for a flash and to operate in all weather conditions.

This is an example of wholesale surveillance, and something I’ve written about before.

Of course, once the system is in place it will be used for privacy violations that we can’t even conceive of.

One of the companies that sells the camera scanning equipment touts it’s potential for marketing applications. “Once the number plate has been successfully ‘captured’ applications for it’s use are limited only by imagination and almost anything is possible,” Westminister International says on its website. UK police also envision a national database that holds time and location data on every vehicle scanned. “This data warehouse would also hold ANPR reads and hits as a further source of vehicle intelligence, providing great benefits to major crime and terrorism enquiries,” a Home Office proposal explains.

The only way to maintain security is not to field this sort of system in the first place.

Posted on April 15, 2005 at 12:10 PM • View Comments

Security Risks of Biometrics

From the BBC:

Police in Malaysia are hunting for members of a violent gang who chopped off a car owner’s finger to get round the vehicle’s hi-tech security system.

The car, a Mercedes S-class, was protected by a fingerprint recognition system.

What interests me about this story is the interplay between attacker and defender. The defender implements a countermeasure that causes the attacker to change his tactics. Sometimes the new tactics are more harmful, and it’s not obvious whether or not the countermeasure was worth it.

I wrote about something similar in Beyond Fear (p. 113):

Someone might think: “I am worried about car theft, so I will buy an expensive security device that makes ignitions impossible to hot-wire.” That seems like a reasonable thought, but countries such as Russia, where these security devices are commonplace, have seen an increase in carjackings. A carjacking puts the driver at a much greater risk; here the security countermeasure has caused the weakest link to move from the ignition switch to the driver. Total car thefts may have declined, but drivers’ safety did, too.

Posted on April 1, 2005 at 9:12 AM • View Comments

Automobile Virus

SC Magazine is reporting on a virus that infects Lexus cars:

Lexus cars may be vulnerable to viruses that infect them via mobile phones. Landcruiser 100 models LX470 and LS430 have been discovered with infected operating systems that transfer within a range of 15 feet.

It seems that no one has done this yet, and the story is based on speculation that a cell phone can transfer a virus to the Lexus using Bluetooth. But it’s only a matter of time before something like this actually works.

Posted on February 2, 2005 at 8:00 AM • View Comments

An Impressive Car Theft

The armored Mercedes belonging to the CEO of DaimlerChrysler has been stolen:

The black company car, which is worth about 800,000 euros ($1 million), disappeared on the night of Oct. 26, police spokesman Klaus-Peter Arand said in a telephone interview. The limousine, which sports a 12-cylinder engine and is equipped with a broadcasting device to help retrieve the car, hasn’t yet been found, the police said.

There are two types of thieves, whether they be car thieves or otherwise. First, there are the thieves that want a car, any car. And second, there are the thieves that want one particular car. Against the first type, any security measure that makes your car harder to steal than the car next to it is good enough. Against the second type, even a sophisticated GPS tracking system might not be enough.

Posted on December 1, 2004 at 11:01 AM • View Comments

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Sidebar photo of Bruce Schneier by Joe MacInnis.