• Uriel238 [all pronouns]@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    11 months ago

    The problem with a vehicle kill switch is the same problem as an encryption backdoor for law enforcement. It will leak, quickly (inside a year) and so not only will law enforcement misuse this power (history shows they’ve misused all powers they’ve been given) but nefarious interests will use it to cause havoc.

    • bobs_monkey@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      Might be more difficult than that. I’m in the hunt for a new work truck, a ram 2500. I’m specifically targeting a 2019-2020, because the 4G cellular module is easily removed, whereas in newer models it is soldered directly to a main telematics board and is pretty tricky to remove.

      These companies don’t want you removing these systems in their current state, as they’re harvesting your data and selling it off as another revenue stream. I suspect these future monitoring systems, if removed, will brick the vehicle in one way or another.

      • oatscoop@midwest.social
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        11 months ago

        Just disconnect the antenna and/or cover the module with something that will block any wireless signals. It’s easier upfront and simple to undo when you want to sell the vehicle.

        It was my go-to solution whenever I bought a vehicle with OnStar.

      • teamevil@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        I suspect that like John Deere there will be a Ukrainian style hack that undermines this bullshit.

      • lemmyvore@feddit.nl
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        11 months ago

        A vehicle that doesn’t work without internet? That should turn out well.

      • EmoBean@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        Look at fleet trucks. Usually you can get them without any bs. Like even no ac, just a frame, body, and powertrain.

        Also fancy electronics like that are pretty easy to disable hardware wise. Break a cap in the voltage regulation, break a few pins of a IC, anything really that functional kills it but still let’s everything else think it’s there or there a problem it has to ignore. Like microphone modules, I shove a pin it and scramble it then fill it with CA glue. Hardware thinks it’s there but it ain’t doing anything.

    • Otter@lemmy.ca
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      11 months ago

      Someone linked a nice explainer on the topic in this thread, but my takeaway was that this is unlikely to ever exist

      TLDR of the TLDR (which I recommend reading)

      • the regulatory body is super slow, and won’t approve a change unless all the ducks are in a row

      • there’s no safe way to stop or disable a car while it’s moving, so the regulatory body won’t approve it anytime soon

      • CompostMaterial@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        That second part isn’t really true. Many cars now have cellular modems in them to provide WiFi and infotainment features. That means there is already a remote access capability in those vehicles. Disabling a modern vehicle with software is easy enough as the spark is controlled by the cars computer. So having a built-in feature to allow a remote actor to limit or disable the vehicle’s spark isn’t a big leap.

        • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          Safely stopping a car. Safely. Unless you’re already stopped at an intersection or something you’ve got a really big chance of getting hit.

          • scottywh@lemmy.world
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            11 months ago

            Even just remaining stopped significantly longer than expected at an intersection can easily get you into an accident in lots of places.

        • atrielienz@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          That’s not really how it works even when a new car goes into limp mode. Usually what happens isn’t that they limit the spark. It’s that the PCM (Power train Control Module) provides a ground to various systems (which are always powered via the battery/alternator charging system). When the PCM or ECM (Electronics Control Module that monitors network traffic in the vehicle) detects missing voltage from a monitored network sensor, or too much voltage from a monitored network sensor) it will put your vehicle into limp mode to prevent more damage that would occur if you keep driving. For instance if your camshaft sensor is providing a reading that would suggest it’s not spinning or is “stuck”. That could do internal damage to the engine if the vehicle continues to be driven.

          But even so what they meant was that disabling a vehicle in motion is actually dangerous to the driver, any passengers and any other people driving or riding on the road.

          Additionally, if the government can do it, that tech could be used by a bad actor for the same purpose and that’s just not going to fly.

          • AstridWipenaugh@lemmy.world
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            11 months ago

            If I’m trying to pass on a dotted yellow (legal) and my car thinks I’m drunk and kills the engine or governs me to 10 mph, I’m fucked. Remotely stopping a car without situational review is super dangerous (for humans in them).

      • hltdev@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        …but wait you don’t love accidently talking to someone in Texas every time you go to turn your dome light off/on ?

    • SangersSequence@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

      They can be a source of egregious right wing propaganda undermining our democracy at every turn (which they are), and also occasionally still have legitimate grievances with our legislators sneaking bullshit like this into otherwise critical legislation.

    • AstridWipenaugh@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      They cited their sources and included direct quotations from the bill. Are you saying any of their claims about what the bill says are untrue? It’s good to have a healthy amount of skepticism, especially for groups with known biases, but what’s your point in calling this out here?

      • Sparlock@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        Over the last century, the Land of the Free has slowly transformed into a land governed by endless laws, largely by cracking down on vices instead of actual crimes, creating a society that would render us all criminals if our behavior were constantly observed.

        Just the framing of the first line is like something out of an Ayn Rand hallucination. When I see something that heavily tilted the first thing I look for is WHO is writing it and WHY would they.

        • Buddahriffic@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          I mean, even if I think libertarians are overall not very smart, I do think their stance on vice laws is the right one.

        • HorseWithNoName@lemm.ee
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          11 months ago

          The part that got me is when they quoted the text of the bill and then linked to the bill.

          But yes, the constant “slamming” of democrats is pretty biased. I can’t say I wholly disagree with that first paragraph, but anything that uses “land of the free” unironically usually has an angle.

          • pingveno@kbin.social
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            11 months ago

            Especially anyone who believes that individuals are less free now than they were historically in the United States. Only the ignorant or biased make that claim.

      • yogurt@lemm.ee
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        11 months ago

        Yes one of their quotes is the opinion section of the bill at the beginning that has no effect on the law.

        And “kill switch” is trying to get you to think that the police get a button to turn off the car, which is the one thing it doesn’t do. It wants the thing most current luxury cars have where the car detects the driver falling asleep, but tune it to also detect drunk driving.

        That’s also bad if you just want a manual car that isn’t full of DRM, but FEE is trying to tell idiots that BRANDON is giving the BUREAU OF LAND MANAGEMENT a SWITCH to KILL YOUR FAMILY just like in your favorite CAMERON DIAZ movie THE BOX (2009).

      • Icaria@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        They cited their sources and included direct quotations from the bill.

        And the direct quotations from the bill were less-than-damning without several paragraphs of editorial leading the reader down the garden path. This is on the same level as the ‘death panel’ hysteria from about 10 years ago.

        At some point in the future cars will have to incl. some form of assistance technology as a standard feature, big whoop. It doesn’t say it has to be enabled by default, or always turned on, and with all the assists and autonomous driving features already being added to cars, it’s very likely most manufacturers will end up meeting the requirements of the bill without even trying.

        If

        driver behaving erratic and interfering with safe function of car

        Then

        pull safely to the side of the road and temporarily disable ignition

        BuT mUh FrEeDoMs. Something something ‘right to travel’ = right to operate a car whilst intoxicated (sounds like some SovCit bullshit), as opposed to right to a functional public transport system or something…

  • EmoBean@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    I sure hope I never get injured using my chainsaw out in the forest with no cell service. It’s going to be so awesome bleeding out in a truck that cuts to 5mph max because I’m too busy holding the tourniquet on my leg while I drive. That’s certainly NEVER happened. NEVER happens, to nobody, including my mother.

    • qooqie@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Wild that’s exactly what happened to one of my professors. He like to log for a side gig (dunno why) and nearly chopped his leg off with his chainsaw and had to hold his leg together while he hauled ass to the hospital.

      • EmoBean@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        Yup. Quick slip is all it takes. My mom and plenty of other people have had it happen.

        • EmoBean@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          Holy shit, I just realized the true problem! We need to make chainsaws illegal to own, operate, and manufacture. Just look at the statistics. Oh my God, I am the human that figured it out! Make chainsaws illegal!

  • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    I’m just waiting for the moment that this kill switch is hacked, and whole cities come to a complete standstill.

  • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    So this isn’t an external kill switch. It’s far more likely to be a lane and driver monitoring system integral to the car itself.

    The big problem is what do you do with a car that’s stopped itself? Obviously you need emergency services, and obviously you can’t depend on the passengers to call them. So the real effect here is to mandate the integration of vehicles into the emergency service networks so the car can call up dispatch.

    I would say this is another brick in the argument for an open source car operating system that keeps the car offline and gives you the tools you want.

    • Clegko@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      I would say this is another brick in the argument for an open source car operating system

      …Go analog with a carb, maybe? Only thing that can stop a carb from working is it being out of gas. Or changing altitude. Or bad fuel. Or it’s too cold and/or hot. … OK lots of things can stop carbs, but the government sure can’t, at least.

    • DeathsEmbrace@lemmy.ml
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      11 months ago

      Jailbreaking cars will be the new software development in piracy. Just wait for someone to figure out a way to permanently disable this entire system.

    • rustyriffs@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Do you think that last sentence will ever happen though? I’d be stoked if it did, but the cynical side of me says we’re already doomed…

        • rustyriffs@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          Yeah, that’s kind of what I think too. Maybe someone will figure out how to jailbreak, like another commenter suggested.

  • spaxxor@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    I see where they’re coming from, but like every good idea the government has had its going to be abused and mutated into Satan’s Christmas tree of a bill, and either be draconian or useless.

    Also, this idea is shit for brains stupid lol

  • riodoro1@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    American solution to a problem of deadly car chases.

    I guess „don’t chase cars” would be too simple.

    • Tarquinn2049@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      So any crime committed while in a car is free-game? No need for license plates, just buy a generic looking car and never stop.

      • riodoro1@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        You just said license plates dude.

        All around the world when the police sees you speeding in a school zone and you don’t stop they won’t go and speed in a school zone as well. But we also don’t sell guns in supermarkets and later have a problem with gun violence.

        • Tarquinn2049@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          What I said was why would someone that plans to commit a crime have a license plate? Since they just have to not stop and the police can’t do anything if they can’t chase.

          Chasing sucks, I 100% agree it’s a terrible solution. But what other solution is there that can be implemented? Please come up with one so that we can actually do away with chasing. Somebody work on this problem.

          You’re saying, cops shouldn’t chase cars. What would happen next if they can’t chase cars? They already have all kinds of rules for breaking it off for safety. And they keep making more. If there was a better solution, they would be all for it. In alot of cases, backing off can decrease safety for a bit too, so they have to be careful when they stop chasing too. The lights and sirens help keep people safer around the speeding car.

          It’s not an easy problem, there is no easy solution. It’ll keep evolving as small solutions for parts of what sucks about it are thought of.

          • Rediphile@lemmy.ca
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            11 months ago

            You say ‘what would happen if they didn’t chase cars?’ as if it’s hypothetical, but many places already do this.

            So, what happens? They will turn on lights and sirens speed up a bit and make it clear the car should pull over. If it doesn’t, they continue to follow it with lights and sirens. If the bad guy starts driving in a manner dangerous to the public specifically in an attempt to flee, they back off. And then radio the vehicle description to a unit further ahead. Sometimes the unit ahead is unmarked, finds it, and is able to follow at safe speed. Later try to arrest occupants when they get out or can be pinned with confidence. There are also other tools available like traffic cameras and aircraft.

            Yes, this sometimes causes people to get away. But it also sometimes saves lives of random bystanders…so some places decide it as a worthwhile trade off. And no these countries aren’t wastelands with Mad Max roads of death.

            You are right about some situations being more dangerous not to pursue. Which is why if someone is intentionally running over people, or shooting at everyone, or some other very intense situation… the police don’t back off. But for a speeding ticket, for sure backing off.

            • Tarquinn2049@lemmy.world
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              11 months ago

              But the US has all that too, and uses all that. The chases really only happen with non-descript stolen vehicles. Or when the occupants of the vehicle would be in more danger if the pursuit was called off than if it continued. And there is a constant analysis as to when the threat to the public outweighs the threat to the occupant.

              It’s not like the police are idiots or don’t have access to the same or better intelligence tools. They have to call in high-speed pursuits and there is constant oversight.

              I think pursuits are overall much safer than it makes it seem when you see them on TV or YouTube, because the boring ones don’t make it there, but the vast, vast majority are indeed boring.

  • TwilightVulpine@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    This is already a concerning power to hand to a government, which could cause issues regarding the right of freedom of movement. But even if we assume an ideal and responsible government that never misuses their powers, can we be sure such a backdoor would be secure enough not to be exploited by other parties?

    • Kbin_space_program@kbin.social
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      11 months ago

      Looking at the other articles on the site, I count one antivaxx and another that claims the newly elected fascist in Argentina is a “Libertarian”.

      Thanks for linking to a sane review.

      • Wrench@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        I literally downvoted before reading anything besides the title. An unknown publication making an outlandish claim. Obvious rage bait. It’s sad to see so many of these nothing stories gain traction here. It’s so fucking obvious.

    • yukichigai@kbin.social
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      11 months ago

      I think the analysis is correct in that the implementation will die in committee before ever making it to effect, not to mention the practical considerations of implementing this in the lighting-fast timeframe of 3 years. However, I cannot help but point out this part:

      So far, not a kill switch, but some kind of technology to detect if you’re driving like a drunk person and disable the vehicle.

      “Disable the vehicle” is literally what people mean when they talk about a “kill switch”. At best that’s an argument over semantics. The law mandates a thing that deliberately stop your car from functioning. That’s a kill switch.

    • admiralteal@kbin.social
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      11 months ago

      It’s not a lie. There’s no malicious intent. It’s just not even wrong. It so fundamentally lacks understanding of the underlying bureaucracy, technology, product lifecycle, and surrounding politics politics that it amounts to nothing.

      And the overall point still stands. We should be skeptical of these kinds of intrusions into our devices from the state. We should resist them as a default posture.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    I’m sure we’ll never find out that the kill switch was disproportionately used on people of color.

      • tinkeringidiot@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        Cars are computers. All those fancy features run on software. Software can be patched to get rid of unpleasant functionality.

        It’s not always easy, but it’s doable, and the more of these stupid features they add, the more people spend time working on undoing them.

          • tinkeringidiot@lemmy.world
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            11 months ago

            Oh, sorry. American cars are require to ship with a feature that shuts the engine off at stop lights, and restarts it when you take your foot off the brake. It’s done to supposedly help the environment, which it doesn’t do in the least and is also incredibly irritating.

            So car hackers reconfigure their cars to disable that feature.

            • Alexstarfire@lemmy.world
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              11 months ago

              Got some studies for that? Cause everything I’ve seen suggested that FAS, forced auto-stop, does help.

              • Clegko@lemmy.world
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                11 months ago

                It only helps when people leave it on.

                It’s a small sample size, but literally everyone I know that owns a car with that feature turns it off immediately after starting the car every time they get in it.

              • grayman@lemmy.world
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                11 months ago

                It adds wear and tear to a car. The hot engine no longer has coolant running through it, hot oil drains off, etc. This is especially bad for turbos. So now the engine wears out sooner, which means the car is replaced sooner. Pulling a car out of service adds a huge amount of production resources, energy, and waste to an individual’s footprint.

                There are also calculations that can be done to determine how much fuel is saved. More fuel is burned at startup. You have to be stopped and off for a minimum period of time to reduce fuel consumption. That time is heavily dependent on many factors. But it’s been found that generally you’re not saving fuel unless you’re at a light just as it turns red.

                The wear and tear is the biggest issue. The worst thing you can do to an otherwise normal working engine is take it from 0 to 5000+ rpm in such short time.

              • tinkeringidiot@lemmy.world
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                11 months ago

                It’s not explicitly required by law, but that doesn’t make it any less mandatory. It’s one of those “we’re not saying you have to, we’re just saying we’ll beat you up if you don’t” rules federal agencies (EPA, in this case) love so much.

                Car and Driver explains some of the reasoning here, though they forget to mention efficiency standards that are explicitly mandated.

                https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a19561461/automakers-increasingly-offer-ways-to-deactivate-stopstart-systems-temporarily/

                • atrielienz@lemmy.world
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                  11 months ago

                  Not all American cars have this. We literally just bought a Honda Civic and it doesn’t have auto stop start. That’s not to mention hybrids and electric cars. It’s implemented by car manufacturers as far as I can tell in order to meet gas efficiency requirements of the NHTSA and it’s mostly for larger consumer vehicles. SUV’s, and trucks, not your average sedan. I don’t think you represented this very well in your first comment.

      • atrielienz@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        Autostart stop. It’s a “feature” of newer gasoline vehicles that allows them to save gas by shutting the engine off when you’re idling (at a stop light or similar) until you touch the throttle/gas pedal and the computer reactivates the engine. This assumes there isn’t significant load on the battery like there would be if you were using your heat/AC or even the radio.

  • KroninJ@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    Next step will be to have it drive you to the police station and alert them of your arrival.

  • Snapz@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    Don’t have time right now the deep dive into that absolute wall of text. Did get a few paragraphs in to find that your champion is Thomas Massie ® (Nut Job), that’s clarity enough for now…