All police chases eventually come to an end, but we may soon see the end of all police chases.Why, no, this won't be abused at all. Nosirree bob. Not like "no-knock" warrants, APCs for Podunk PD, or drug seizure vehicles. Nope. Not going to be abused. I'm sure that no self-important Officer Roid Rage would ever take it upon himself to target someone that pissed him off and make their life a living hell by disabling their car at random points or anything like that.
A secret plan requiring that every car that entering Europe be fitted with a system that would allow them to be tracked and disabled remotely by law enforcement has been revealed, The Daily Telegraph reports.
To say nothing of the legal ramifications of shutting down a car and having the driver panic - or be unable (or unwilling) to move the car off the road to a safe location. Imagine someone in a high speed chase having their power cut and being unable to work the power steering or brakes, and crashing. What's the liability going to be like on that one?
On a side note, I just have to say:
Really? I'm sorry, if that pulled in behind me trying to get me to pull over, well... Actually, it might work. I would have to pull off to the side of the road so that I didn't wreck my truck laughing at the little car. Of course, if they disabled my truck and I came to a stop too quickly, there's the very real danger that little weiniemobile would wind up in the back of my truck by accident...
I didn't know that Husqvarna made police cars...
That is all.
Another dispatch from...
(image courtesy of Robb Allen)
8 comments:
That's not Husqvarna, that's Mattel.
Bah. Every 13 year old can jailbreak a phone, I'm sure it will take them about 5 minutes to figure this one out.
Just steal police cars.
Gerry
Not to mention the havoc a hacker could cause if the network were compromised. Shutting off hundreds of thousands of cars across Europe all at once? Economic impact alone would be staggering, not to mention potential safety concerns.
2 of my vehicles are onstar equipped but never activated. But I'll bet that it could be activated remotely if the car was running. Particularly the Merccedes, since it is my understanding that the emergecy button still works even if you don't subscribe.
Having spent a decade (thankfully, no more!) in retail automotive sales, I can assure you all...
On-Star is active, ALL. OF. THE. DAMN. TIME. Whether or not you've activated your account is immaterial. The damn thing is always on, it WILL contact the On-Star desk if you're in a wreck, and they CAN switch on your car's microphone so that interested "authorities" can listen in.
Your car CAN be tracked, at will, and a signal can be transmitted which will cut your engine's output to only 20%. It'll put you on the side of the road, but you'll still have power steering and brakes. When it senses that you've come to a complete stop, it'll shut the engine off.
Never buy a GM product, for this and so many other reasons.
Jim
Sunk New Dawn
Galveston, TX
Yeah, I give it about 30 seconds after this system goes live (whether its goes live publicly, or quietly) that the whole shebang is compromised. Lots of money for hackers to ensure that the "right" vehicles are not able to be disabled, or "protection" money to keep that from happening. Or the random kid in his parents' basement who thinks it'll be a blast to hack in and cut steering/brakes on all cars on the highway all at once, while leaving the engine going (or flooring the accelerator...."nope, that wasn't a mob hit at all...just some guy who went 150mph down the winding mountain road...")
Yeah. I can see absolutely NO way this system could ever fail.
/sarc
No doubt the new system that our DOT wants installed into our vehicles will be set up to do the same.
http://tinyurl.com/la5puzv
The spokesman for the DOT tells us that they government won't be able to tap into the data.
Just as they told us the airport scanners couldn't save all those images. Until it came out that the scanners could and did store all those images.
As we know all to well now, if the government can get your data, the government WILL get your data.
Not to mention the hackers, because as Borepatch will tell you security on automobile computer systems is just about non existent.
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