The Coming Terrorist Threat From Autonomous Vehicles 214
HughPickens.com writes: Alex Rubalcava writes that autonomous vehicles are the greatest force multiplier to emerge in decades for criminals and terrorists and open the door for new types of crime not possible today. According to Rubalcava, the biggest barrier to carrying out terrorist plans until now has been the risk of getting caught or killed by law enforcement so that only depraved hatred, or religious fervor has been able to motivate someone to take on those risks as part of a plan to harm other people. "A future Timothy McVeigh will not need to drive a truck full of fertilizer to the place he intends to detonate it," writes Rubalcava. "A burner email account, a prepaid debit card purchased with cash, and an account, tied to that burner email, with an AV car service will get him a long way to being able to place explosives near crowds, without ever being there himself." A recent example is instructive. Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev were identified by an examination of footage from numerous private security cameras that were recording the crowd in downtown Boston during the Marathon. Imagine if they could have dispatched their bombs in the trunk of a car that they were never in themselves? Catching them might have been an order of magnitude more difficult than it was.
According to Rubalcava the reaction to the first car bombing using an AV is going to be massive, and it's going to be stupid. There will be calls for the government to issue a stop to all AV operations, much in the same way that the FAA made the unprecedented order to ground 4,000-plus planes across the nation after 9/11. "But unlike 9/11, which involved a decades-old transportation infrastructure, the first AV bombing will use an infrastructure in its infancy, one that will be much easier to shut down" says Rubalcava. "That shutdown could stretch from temporary to quasi-permanent with ease, as security professionals grapple with the technical challenge of distinguishing between safe, legitimate payloads and payloads that are intended to harm." (And don't forget The Dead Pool.)
According to Rubalcava the reaction to the first car bombing using an AV is going to be massive, and it's going to be stupid. There will be calls for the government to issue a stop to all AV operations, much in the same way that the FAA made the unprecedented order to ground 4,000-plus planes across the nation after 9/11. "But unlike 9/11, which involved a decades-old transportation infrastructure, the first AV bombing will use an infrastructure in its infancy, one that will be much easier to shut down" says Rubalcava. "That shutdown could stretch from temporary to quasi-permanent with ease, as security professionals grapple with the technical challenge of distinguishing between safe, legitimate payloads and payloads that are intended to harm." (And don't forget The Dead Pool.)
Massive and stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
is going to be massive, and it's going to be stupid. There will be calls for the government to issue a stop to all AV operations, much in the same way that the FAA made the unprecedented order to ground 4,000-plus planes across the nation after 9/11.
That wasn't a stupid decision. It was a reversible order to prevent any immediate further terrorist attack that might be planned until they could get a handle on the situation and figure out who we were at war with and what to do in terms of airline security. While we ultimately made really stupid decisions about airline security, it was the right call. If you remember the mood of the general public on 9/11, we would all have considered it profoundly stupid to let most commercial airlines fly right after that, at least without better precautions than were standard. They had just flown an airplane into the Pentagon and another had crashed on its way toward the Capitol or White House. We had thousands of planes in the air we were trying to keep track of and only a few military jets ready to intercept.
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It was a knee-jerk panic-reaction that played into the terrorist's hands by massively amplifying the damage. If that is not utterly stupid, I do not know what is. Of course, governments must always appear to "be in control", so they cannot admit any error. And of course, if the FBI had not screwed up so massively before, nothing noteworthy would have happened on 9/11. But again, that cannot really be admitted, and the very agency that made 9/11 possible is still in charge of fighting a repeat, when it shoul
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Calling something "silly" has zero argumentative value. It just illustrates that you have no good arguments.
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The attacks on 11 September 2001 could have been prevented by the airliner passengers choosing not to remain in their seats and sending text messages or calling home, but instead putting down the would-be hijackers. Back in those days passengers were carrying knives, knitting needles, scissors, hairspray and assorted other items capable of being "weaponised." The Government has deliberately and with malice of forethought decided to overreact by curtailing the freedoms of the People.
The real world isn't a Steven Segal film and real people are not marines. A trained and vicious hijacker (or several) would generally be able to control the situation, and you can't realistically think it is reliable to leave security to normal folk to rising up. Pretty classy thing, blaming the passengers with your hindsight. Anyway, since in the actual situation they largely didn't go all kung fu on hijacker-ass, clearly taking weapons out of the situation rather than arming everybody is the only sensible
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The passengers on Flight 93 are the heroes you deride. Given your UID, you're not a youngster, so you lived through 9/11 and you should remember the hijacking a that occasionally took place before; the rule was always "let the hijackers have their way and everyone gets out alive". Once the passengers of Flight 93 figured out what their fate was, they went full Steven Segal, forcing the hijackers to abort mission and crash the plane prematurely.
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"Are you guys ready? Let's roll." -Todd Beamer
The passengers on Flight 93 are the heroes you deride.
Absolutely not - I don't deride them at all. In fact what they did was *all the more remarkable* for the fact that people don't in general do that, and they couldn't really have been sure that their situation was unwinnable. But they were still one plane out of 4. It was the grandparent poster that was deriding the other planes' passengers for somehow not being superhuman like Flight 93.
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people don't in general do that
Oh, but they do. People are violent. You're old enough to remember that we had to be constantly reminded in mass media and by the stewardesses to not try to wrestle with hijackers; to do things the "civilized" way. People followed the rules until it was clear the rules didn't apply. Then they acted. And they've acted many times since. Sure, it wouldn't hurt to have a few more air marshals, but what good are four air marshals compared to a plane full of passengers with knives? Pen knives used to be ca
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I think your argument is invalidate by the fact that a group of normal people did fight back, even in the exact instance that is being referred to.
This. Before 9/11 - stay in your seat and cooperate. During and after 9/11 - take down the terrorists at any cost. Here's proof:
http://aviation-safety.net/sta... [aviation-safety.net]
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The problem is, who is going to go first? I'd like to think that I'd be that guy but I've never been on a hijacked airplane before - and I hope I never am.
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Re:Massive and stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
Back then it was common that a plane hijacking meant an unexpected side trip to some third world country, some hours in an airport, and a trip back home. That ALSO changed on 9/11 and is considered the main reason that the last plane crashed because the passengers heard what happened to the first ones and took up the fight.
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I want to say you're wrong but a feel good story of people fighting back is exactly what was needed at the time.
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You have obviously never investigated an aircraft crash. I have. Engines and landing gear are the most dense, solid bit of an airplane and often end up surprisingly intact some distance away. Put you tinfoil hat back on.
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my interpretation was that until 9/11 nobody thought they were going to die.
iran hostage crisis comes to mind, the bad guys wanted something and generally hostages are worth more alive. The passengers thought they were going to live until planes started hitting buildings.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
when people found out the plan was for everybody aboard to die, and not simply for everybody aboard get traded for prisoners or money, they acted and brought the plane down.
A simple solution (Score:2)
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The problem then becomes, how to prevent the clever bad guy (with physical access to an AV for as much time as he needs) from fooling the AV into thinking it is carrying a person.
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Why would you think that AVs are only for humans? Much of the world's transport has nothing to do with humans. Ships, planes, trains and road vehicles are used for products and materials delivery and even now there are very few humans in those vehicles or on the phone telling them where to go. In the future, shippers will find it expedient to remove the last remaining humans from the system.
Re:A simple solution (Score:5, Insightful)
And the simple solution to that, from the terrorist point of view, is just to use either a willing suicide bomber (there seem to be plenty of those) or an unknowing patsy.
This is a load of fuss about nothing, firstly because the terrorist threat is not as remotely terrible as everyone seems to think it is, and secondly because autonomous vehicles really don't change anything at all.
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And the simple solution to that, from the terrorist point of view, is just to use either a willing suicide bomber (there seem to be plenty of those) or an unknowing patsy.
I'd guess for a first try, I'd put a suitably bound large dog or pig in the passenger seat.
Oh wait, I think I might have just restated your suggestion.
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I'd put a suitably bound large dog or pig in the passenger seat.
It's been done [wikia.com].
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Going back to the main point: that changes everything.
No, it doesn't. There are people willing to blow themselves up for their cause, and there are plenty of ways for people to blow things up without killing themselves.
As far as furthering terrorist aims goes, autonomous vehicles are a solution in search of a problem.
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no, if money is very little issue, it's the difference between having a oneshot, vs multi-shot weapon.
part of the difficulty must be getting an agent in place. I imagine having a single agent capable of carrying out multiple attacks before getting caught will be much more effective than having a single agent killing themselves for each attack.
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Terrorist: "Hi, Bob's business freight courier service? I've got a lead on some test petroleum product I need shipped from the seller's address in Indiana to my office here in Fort Worth, TX. It's all packaged up and ready to ship. Just arrive at the loading dock and use the dock phone to call my number and I'll be down to accept delivery."
Petroleum product meaning standard fertilizer/petroleum mixture so favored for explosives. Office being the target building. And the number he calls from the dock p
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Exactly, there are so many opportunities for high impact terrorist attacks everyday that the vanishingly rare occurrence demonstrates that the threat is barely worth acknowledging. That is true for much of the industrialized world.
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:) yay, you've just added to the death toll of each terrorist attack by 1 kidnapped and unconscious passenger :)
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This has nothing to do with hacking. It's someone putting a bomb in a car or truck, and setting the nav destination.
misdirection.. (Score:5, Insightful)
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sure payload and range are currently limitations, but creativity, through say, fleets of autonomous drones (which are too AVs) are a possible approach in using hobbyist drones in the not too distance future.
AVs are about doing things in scale, and it's going to change the paradigm--we're all thinking about these 'lone wolf' situations...
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Some current hobby UAVs have more than enough payload and range for assassination or mayhem and they will be getting better on both accounts. Navigation and autonomous operation will be improving as well.
The problem is State control, not terrorist (Score:3, Interesting)
The problem is not terrorisst control, it is *State* control.
If cars can be remotely controlled, it is *inevitable* the State will require the ability to do so - to prevent crime, terrorism, for safety purposes, you name it.
All good reasons *but* with the appalling unintended outcome that the State will end up literally able to shut down at will every single car in the country, or have them lock their doors and drive themselves to the nearest police station.
The last ten years have seen the expansion of State power into the complete monitoring of all commuication - in the next decade or so, the State will gain control over personal transportation. States are terrible things. They are so unable to act with and with only their intended consequence that any power they have causes great harm.
Instead of technical solutions (Score:3)
Re:Instead of technical solutions (Score:5, Insightful)
Really? Many of the idiots fighting for Daesh left middle class life styles in both Euro and Mid-East countries because they think they are fighting for a new order on this dirtball planet. It is the old order of 600 A.D., but they think of it as new. And they need Allah on the brain to deafen the cries of their suffering victims.
A small group of mentally ill people (Score:2)
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As opposed to freedom fighters who blow people up in order to "liberate" them?
It's not the religion of Islam but the religion of violence - the idea that the ends justify the means - that creates terrorists. And violence is pretty much universally worshipped on Earth, in forms ranging all the way from ritualistic animal sacrifice to all-out war. Our future depends on if it's a true universal constant or a mere option that could potentially be unchosen before ou
prepaid won't work (Score:2)
CC companies and their clients aren't that stupid. If you try and sign up for zipcar with a prepaid credit card, it won't work.
Ditto for any recurring billing CC service.
I'll tell you what I am afraid of. (Score:5, Funny)
I'm afraid of autonomous cars carrying drones that drop bombs and fire 3D printed weapons.
I'm also afraid of drones carrying autonomous cars that are equipped with 3D printed weapons.
And 3D printed weapons that fire autonomous cars from drones.
BULLSH!Tq (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know all the laws and regulations we will create, but I absolutely guarantee you that unlicensed vehicles will NOT be allowed to drive around with no people and load of cargo, unless they picked up that cargo at a licensed and regulated facility (aka UPS, FedEx, Amazon, etc.). There will be sensors in non-licensed vehicles to make sure that if they have any cargo in them, they have to have a person in them at first. Licensed vehicles will most likely be airborne with very light cargo capacity at first (if you don't have a human, it makes more sense to fly).
No, these sensors will not be easy to counter.
And vehicles will also have hard coded restrictions on where they can go and can't go.
The vehicles will NOT even have a receiving antenna, not at first. At first they will require instructions to be made inside the car, with the door closed - and cancel them when the door opens. They will however broadcast their destination to be recorded by the police, but not be able to receive any radio commands.
And most importantly, it is already possible to JUST as much damage, simply by taking a stolen van full of explosives, parking it some place, and leaving it set to detonate in 20 minutes. The author of this paper is clueless about both the current level of risk we have and the level of risk we will accept in the future
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I absolutely guarantee you that unlicensed vehicles will NOT be allowed to drive around with no people and load of cargo
What do you mean by "allowed"? Do you imagine it being illegal, or actually impossible?
No, these sensors will not be easy to counter.
That's easy to say when you've only defined them as "these sensors." Will the vehicle refuse to move by itself if I leave a newspaper on the front seat? Or if it gets caked in mud after I drive it through a field, adding to the vehicle's weight? This will mean the end of stick-on Garfields as well!
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You better go tell Google/etc that are developing these systems to start putting these safeguards in place.
Dumbest fear mongering yet on Slashdot... (Score:5, Insightful)
honestly this is 100% stupid. If you dont think you can do this RIGHT NOW then you are an uneducated moron. Call up towing service and have a vehicle towed to the rear of a building, or a delivery service.
Honestly Slashdot just needs to change it's name to Gizmodo.
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plenty of hobbyists could make a remotely controlled car on the cheap for use in wifi covered city. Camera, used laptop, D/A board, linear actuators....would such gear need to cost more than $250?
Sporting young terrorist wanting video game feel can realize cost savings by just worrying about steering while throttle jammed to good position, forget accelerator control and braking. Maybe forget about remote camera if in view of the venue.
$250 + paypal & shipping? (Score:2)
Hey get real,
yes "they" could,
but "they" would get caught .. afterwards(like any terrorist)
Also because they are leaving a serialnumber nightmare behind themselves,
- turn your notebook on the back, mac + serialnumber
- buy a gsm modem, IMEI .. ok there are some very few gsm/edge-modems where there is software out in the open to spoof the IMEI.
But yes a disposable phone .. paid with a credit card for .. and videotaped your face on the survailiance cam.
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those kind of terrorists really don't care if they're caught or killed, a remote controlled vehicle just give them chance to maybe make more attacks before being caught or killed. win-win for them
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I hope everyone realizes that there are plenty of autonomous 'vehicles' out there. Right now. With limited security. Most single engine planes have highly developed autopilots. The hard part is getting one to take off autonomously. That could be solved by parachuting out after you reach level flight. Steal a Cessna 185 with your typical Garmin AP. Land it in some field, fill it up and take off at night. Jump out and off the plane goes. You won't get to the White House or the Capital building but y
Hysterical Title? (Score:5, Insightful)
Ooh, no, don't want to get caught (Score:2)
Imagine if they could have dispatched their bombs in the trunk of a car that they were never in themselves? Catching them might have been an order of magnitude more difficult than it was.
Or imagine if they could have found a vulnerable person, someone so suggestable as to be bordering on mentally ill, instilled him with their ideology and persuaded him to go out and get himself blown up.
Or imagine if they hadn't actually given two shits about being caught or not.
According to Rubalcava the reaction to the first car bombing using an AV is going to be massive, and it's going to be stupid.
Why are the terrorists waiting for autonomous vehicles? They've got plenty of other options if they want to make a massive kaboom. Find a willing suicide bomber. Hire someone to do it unwittingly. Deliver the bomb by drone. Break in
This story brought to you by the Teamsters (Score:2)
Remember, we're just looking our for your safety*.
*and by "your safety" we really mean "our own jobs."
harm others, no risk to self ... (Score:2)
from the summary
"...the risk of getting caught or killed by law enforcement so that only depraved hatred, or religious fervor has been able to motivate someone to take on those risks as part of a plan to harm other people."
Of course this Rubalcava guy wants to stir up excitement, panic, whatever. That's what people do during the slow times between real disasters. But I doubt that there are no other ways to harm people without risk. I could make a list but for the fact that unimaginative people like Rubalcav
What Kind of DA Submittal is This? (Score:2)
And while this thread is on
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Any shortage of suicide bombers? (Score:2)
I don't see how this is a worst threat than the current situation provided there plenty suicide bombers available. The driver is only part of the problem to setup a terrorist action against a target. In addition, the AV is much more trackable than any other vehicle and then can be easily and quickly linked to the author. Which defeat partly the purpose of using an AV in first place to not be linked to the terrorist action.
Do you really believe the insurance companies will let these vehicles running without
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Because brainwashing a suicide bomber takes time and effort and he can only be used once. And during that time and effort, there are lots of fail points and exposure to the authorities finding out about the suicide bomber. An individual hacking an AV to direct an attack doesn't require very much in the way of infrastructure or organization or time or effort beyond what is already in place. An
OB xkcd (Score:2)
http://xkcd.com/1559/ [xkcd.com]
Beware the Adam West! (Score:2)
Not gonna lie; the first thing that came to mind was the "Beware the Grey Ghost" episode of Batman: The Animated Series. And however many other times RC cars have been used to blow things up.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Not actually a problem (Score:2)
The thing is (and this is conveniently overlooked by these utterly despicable and repulsive fear-mongers) that there is no effective way to fight terrorism. The only thing possible is after-the-fact identification. Almost all those "terrorists" caught by the FBI are fakes the FBI created itself. Any halfway competent terrorists got to detonate their bombs.
But that means one very important thing (which is really bad for the cause of the fear-mongers and that is one reason they frequently go into hysterics):
Why autonomous cars? (Score:2)
I don't mean to pee in the swimming pool here, but why again exactly do we need autonomous cars, and what's the rush? Have we run out of humans to drive cars? Are there not enough vehicles on the road? Is there full employment to the point where we need robots to drive commercial vehicles because there aren't enough drivers? And don't tell me, "it will be safer" because as long as there are human-driven vehicles sharing the road, it won't be one bit safer to have autonomous vehicles in the mix.
Every tim
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Because drivers are terrible and stupid. Also, this article seems to be unhelpful in the pro AV agenda.
When I pass an accident, I usually think "how inconsiderate" because there is statistically zero chance of an accident being anything other than bad driving. Weather related means the driver was going too fast for the surface or visibility conditions. The rare deer out of nowhere can be handled with better attention and reflexes.
AV won't stop all crashes, with random events like the tire falling off, but i
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You make a good point. The first building I worked in out of college had an elevator operator and he was a cool old dude. Extremely helpful, and much much much more useful than the new digital building directory systems in place today. He could not only tell you which floor and suite you wanted, but he'd give helpful tips on the way up like, "his secretary seems nasty, but if you ask her about her kids in the photo on
The autonomous car is a myth (Score:2)
Let's face it, an autonomous vehicle would have to be an AI device.Seen any AI devices lately? And,... were you impressed? You don't hear the word 'AI' much these days. After decades of promises and verylittle progress outside some niche areas who dare to come out say he's in the AI field?
I saw a 'robot' this afternoon at a maker faire. Ridiculous. Driving a car through mixed traffic in a dynamic environment with pedestrians, children and old folks, unpredictable or incapacitated. It's impossible to do righ
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Have a look at the Google car presentation at TED.
If you record enough cars driving around long enough, you will get a big big database of interactions and you will be able to figure out how to identify the situations from sensor data and code an algorithm of how to react.
Even though a robotic cars will eventually face situations they have never seen, the car will will be an order of magnitude safer than human driven cars. you just have to get the chance of an a sit
Stupid, just stupid (Score:2)
Governments will wait for it. (Score:2)
As always, governments act on potential threats to our safety after somehing has happened. It was obvious a train would be targeted, yet an attack on Thalys had to happen before EU governments started thinking about it. Same will happen with AV's. First an attack has to happen, then they will act. Please, governments of the world: here's your chance to, for once, act before another massacre happens.
Rampage (Score:2)
Going to be a run on blow up dolls and wigs (Score:2)
Thus from an old market a new market emerges.
The comming threat from... (Score:2)
Continuing to project the notion in the world that you (being any group at all) deserve and are worth attacking. Blowing things up is a pretty useless act, there are not many reasons people do it, and if you could limit the sense of doing it by say....not attracting it, its generally pretty rarely an issue.
Course, when you go around dropping bombs on human beings and sending arms to opressive regiemes that do deserve it....well....guess what happens?
And as it is now (Score:2)
Blah, Blah, Blah (Score:2)
" Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev were identified by an examination of footage from numerous private security cameras that were recording the crowd in downtown Boston during the Marathon. Imagine if they could have dispatched their bombs in the trunk of a car that they were never in themselves? Catching them might have been an order of magnitude more difficult than it was."
Let's see. Car...registration, license plates...probably fingerprints, and random DNA from hair. Yeah, that will be a "magnitude more d
Re:woooh technology is out to git ya (Score:5, Funny)
This wouldn't happen if we could track immigrants like FedEx packages!
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No, it would still happen. Perhaps you'd catch some terrorists faster after they have committed their crimes but you already catch them fast anyway.
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This wouldn't happen if we could track immigrants like FedEx packages!
You mean it would track homegrown terrorists like Timmy McVeigh (Oklahoma city bombing) and homegorwn nut jobs like Holmes (Colorado Theater shooter)?
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White people are not terrorists, you silly.
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And he's wrong.
No. Because look the times when we have caught the criminal. We cannot stop them from setting off a bomb, but we will catch them after they do so.
So to be a terrorist you have to be willing to die or
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Mostly because he's assuming that an autonomous car will be exactly like a current car + driver ... but with a really stupid robot driver that will do anything you tell it to do. Don't assume that.
I won't assume anything, but I question how autonomous cars are going to negotiate with other cars, something I do on a daily basis. And I'm not just talking about the famous one-fingered salute. For example, to get out of my driveway I need to make a right hand turn on to a busy street that often has a long line of cars stopped at a light. I've found through trial and error that the quickest way to get moving is to roll my window down, stick my arm out the window, give the next car in line a jaunty wave, a
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Technology is very bad. Fool. Technology is gonna git ya. Fool. I'm telling you, we don't know what technology will do next .. therefore let's try to stop it. Let's stop evolving. Are you a fool who panics when something goes wrong because you don't understand a system and think all problems are unsolvable because you yourself can't think of how to solve them? Well then technology isn't for you. Technology is bad. You don't know nothing about technology, so it means technology will always be bad. Because if a fool like you can't solve it, it must mean non-fools can't come up with a solution either.
I am enamored of your ideas and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
Trying to follow these simple "but! terrorists can use it!" angles is like watching that Thug Life video, Cat Loves To Knock Things Over! [youtube.com]. You know it's a cat video, you've read the title, you know what the cat is about to knock things over, and look, it's happening. Wow. It happened. Cats are cute and we'll watch them do anything. But terrorists aren't cute, so being told to imagine them doing some no-duh obvious thing that could n
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"If the car doesn't have a human shaped heat source in it then pull the car over and have an officer verify occupancy."
The idea behind autonomous vehicles is that after it has delivered us at our destination, it drives itself to an autonomous parking garage or just drives home to get the kids and drive them to school.
Re:There's an easy solution to this problem...True (Score:2)
Actually, I think the parent poster is right. AVs can be set up so that the customer can't send the car to a destination. In the early days of AV cars, no package deliveries will be permitted without a person riding in the car who can answer authentication questions en route.
Also, when renting the car, probably you will be required to show a preregistered ID, and perhaps a message will be sent to your cell phone requiring further authentication responses.
No. I think AV cars *can* be made acceptably secur
Re:There's an easy solution to this problem...True (Score:4, Insightful)
In the early days of AV cars, no package deliveries will be permitted without a person riding in the car
That is knee jerk overkill. There is little evidence that there are massive numbers of domestic terrorists waiting to murder random people at the first opportunity. Anyone could do what the Tsarnaev brothers did, and with a little more brains, they could get away with it. Yet it almost never happens. Autonomous vehicles are not going to change that.
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It won't take a lot of people doing it - just one or two - to clobber a nascent technology. Security is going to be a big issue for autonomous vehicles. Not so much concerning 'terrorist' activities, but much more mundane things: theft, delivering drugs or other interesting packages and a host of other felonies and misdemeanors.
Re: There's an easy solution to this problem...Tru (Score:3)
Agreed. The novelty and utility of not having to own a car will more than compensate for the added inconveniences that the fleet owners will require when they first arrive on the market.
Adter all, something like 4 million people now make their living driving cars and trucks and buses. They and their unions will put up a hell of a fight against automation. Fleet owners will have to bend backwards to allay the many threat scenarios proposed. Validation of driver ID and car passenger is a very small bump i
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Of course, the guard will be a robot too.
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I think the TSA is an effective counterargument to your overconfidence that people will accept that risk. Requiring the removal of belts, shoes, watches, and anything steel shows the absurd lengths bureaucrats will go to when overreacting to threats, even very rare ones. I'm sure the giant corporations behind AV cars will be comparably risk averse. After all, should someone actually deliver a bomb in such a car, they could see an immediate end to their entire business, or such a severe curtailment, stockhol
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I think the TSA is an effective counterargument to your overconfidence that people will accept that risk. Requiring the removal of belts, shoes, watches, and anything steel shows the absurd lengths bureaucrats will go to when overreacting to threats, even very rare ones. I'm sure the giant corporations behind AV cars will be comparably risk averse. After all, should someone actually deliver a bomb in such a car, they could see an immediate end to their entire business, or such a severe curtailment, stockholders could lose faith and sell off.
No, the adoption of AV cars will be gradual and become easier as everyone learns their limits. Initially, the rules for their use will be stricter. As the tech and infrastructure improves, their use will broaden and more variatons will be permitted.
For instance, I'm sure children will not be able to ride unattended until the system gets a few million miles under its belt. The same is likely for unattended package delivery. All it takes is one bomb in one tunnel...
I'm sure that the USA has been very close to handing out overalls to people boarding planes and requiring everyone to remove all personal belongings for check-in and wear the provided overalls to get on the plane.
After all clothing could be disguised explosives!
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In the early days of AV cars, no package deliveries will be permitted without a person riding in the car
That is knee jerk overkill. There is little evidence that there are massive numbers of domestic terrorists waiting to murder random people at the first opportunity. Anyone could do what the Tsarnaev brothers did, and with a little more brains, they could get away with it. Yet it almost never happens. Autonomous vehicles are not going to change that.
In some cultures it would take massive numbers to achieve this effect.
In cultures like the USA or UK it wouldn't even take one. All it would take is an unsubstantiated rumor that one was being planned. Thats how fearful these cultures are.
Re: There's an easy solution to this problem...Tru (Score:2)
That's retarded. I'm sending my Auto to go get the kids and/or the groceries.
Let's just go back to the pre-Industrial age when everybody was "safer". OR - we could stop supporting corrupt, murderous regimes that piss everybody off. The Future or the Past - one will win.
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If the car doesn't have a human shaped heat source in it then pull the car over and have an officer verify occupancy.
Blow up doll with a heater
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BTW that also works if you want to use the HOV lane
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No pun intended but I wish I had
It's an actual product
http://deals.woot.com/deals/de... [woot.com]
Re:There's an easy solution to this problem. (Score:5, Interesting)
Simply put code in the system to allow remote redirection and then in high density areas have a system scan a car using IR. If the car doesn't have a human shaped heat source in it then pull the car over and have an officer verify occupancy.
That just means that each terrorist attack will be preceded by a kidnapping.
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I personally LIKE driving my vehicles....the autonomy and freedom it gives me....and well, I've never in my (getting longer) life owned a car with more than two functional seats, always sports/performance cars.
Every day when I sit in it, fire up the engine and crank up the stereo...even a trip down the street to the grocery store is an adventure and a pleasure.
I feel sorry for folks who think a car is nothing but a means to get from point A to point B.
Life is short...it
Re: (Score:2)
I've often wondered if the people who find every 3 minute car ride an "adventure" are trying to justify to themselves the amount of money they spend on vehicles.
There's nothing wrong with enjoying driving. I'm a motorcyclist, I love the feeling it provides. But not every trip to the store is white knuckle adventure.
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Also, it's funny that you feel sorry for people who consider transportation to be functional rather than exciting?
Maybe it's a sad commentary on YOU that the most exciting thing in your life is a car. Try getting out more. Travel. Experience new things. I feel sorry for YOU if your entire life's pleasure comes from the rather mundane task of getting to the grocery store.
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Requiring an ID is discriminatory.
We already require an ID to operate a vehicle. I have never before heard that described as "discrimination".
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And have these vehicles banned from your state
I'm still working on the whole "get military-grade weapons and troop transports banned from podunk towns" petition. I just don't have the energy to get riled by something else just yet.
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All true, but the simple fact of the matter is that there just aren't enough people willing to commit acts of terrorism for it to matter. Even if Terrorists immediately started using AV's for killing people, they'd have to kill more people than human piloted cars kill now. And that's a pretty tall order. Hell in the USA just last year automobile related accidents killed close to twice as many people as were killed around the world by terrorists.
Safety is always relative. I'd rather have a near complete elim