The influential magazine Private Eye has published an article questioning the safety of connected and automated vehicles, following the software update that caused worldwide computer problems last month.
The correspondent “Hedgehog” who writes about road-related matters points out that the erroneous update which crippled millions of computers caused travel chaos at airports and railway stations, but not on the roads, however this could change with more reliance on connectivity in vehicles.
The writer says that upsides of driverless technology are highlighted, but not so much cyber resilience and maintaining safety depends on “winning a perpetual arms race with criminals, perhaps including state-sponsored ones” and that “the recent computer glitch reminded us tat CAVS wil also need protection from mistakes by good actors.”
“If CAVs suddenly couldn’t connect or had bugs in their movement-controlled software, a smattering of them stopped (or crashed) simultaneously in random places on the M25, it could be enough to halt the capitals orbital motorway,” they continue. “Traffic jams would spread as averting drivers look for other routes, if other routes, especially if those roads have halted CAVs or malfunctioning traffic lights.”
The report concludes that the new government should think very carefully about the Automated Vehicles Act, and whether “Britain’s creaking road network is the best laboratory in which to test the risks of CAV cyber-disruption.”
The full article is in Private Eye.
(Picture – Yay Images)
