
Documents confirm Apple is building self-driving car - r0h1n
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/aug/14/apple-self-driving-car-project-titan-sooner-than-expected
======
draugadrotten
It would be interesting how Apple would handle liability. Considering how
their legalese is written for other products, they would probably not take any
responsibility AT ALL for anything their cars did. This is in very stark
contrast to VOLVO that says the VOLVO company will assume full liability for
accidents caused by their cars!

 _" But, if the car is in autonomous mode and causes a crash, Eugensson [Volvo
Cars' director of government affairs] said Volvo will take responsibility. "It
will be difficult to sell if the driver is still liable. It gives a false
promise." _

[http://www.cnet.com/news/a-ride-in-volvos-autonomous-car-
how...](http://www.cnet.com/news/a-ride-in-volvos-autonomous-car-how-the-next-
step-in-driver-safety-requires-replacing-the-driver/)

Perhaps we will buy self-driving cars from how their contracts look and not
from their tech specs.

~~~
Gys
If Volvo would have to rely on Apple Maps I guess they would not take any
responsibility either ;-)

------
ris
And if you thought Toyota lacked transparency when problems were found in
their systems, boy, you're in for a shock...

~~~
timcederman
Really? You feel that Apple hasn't been forthright with disclosing security
issues or other problems/shortcomings with their products, and then fixing
them in a timely manner?

I am always surprised when I see Apple being discussed on Hacker News. I own
both Android and Apple devices, and my Apple devices are all much more up-to-
date, have better privacy, and better security.

~~~
kw71
I personally trust General Motors (car shuts off), Ford (car erupts in flames)
and Toyota (car won't stop) more than I trust Apple. I will never buy another
Toyota product but I still operate one. Apple is even lower than that for me,
I'm not even using the devices I have. And some of them have flaws that have
not been addressed at all (ooh this item is unsupported now.)

I also think it's ironic that you put privacy in the context of smartphones
(Android implies this) when many people believe that smartphones are spying
devices.

~~~
timcederman
Apple continues to push the industry forward in terms of what privacy and
security options they offer their consumers. Their implementation of TouchID,
disk encryption, and application security is better than anything else out
there. The CIA and FBI have gone on record as saying as how frustrated they
are with Apple's security. Do you really think iPhones can be used as spying
devices?

~~~
ris
"TouchID"

Largely meaningless from a security standpoint (easily bypassable), and it
enables _someone_ to build a large database of fingerprint hashes. (Don't give
me any of that "it doesn't upload the actual fingerprints" \- uploading hashes
is just as useful to security services)

"disk encryption"

You trust Apple way, way too much.

"The CIA and FBI have gone on record as saying as how frustrated they are with
Apple's security."

Which is exactly what they _would_ say, wouldn't they?

"Do you really think iPhones can be used as spying devices?"

Yes.

In fact I have little doubt.

~~~
Osmium
> [Touch ID] enables someone to build a large database of fingerprint hashes.
> (Don't give me any of that "it doesn't upload the actual fingerprints" \-
> uploading hashes is just as useful to security services)

This is speaking from a position of ignorance. Apple has been leading the way
with responsible fingerprint management, in contrast to nearly every other
fingerprint-capable device manufacturer out there (e.g. see HTC's recent
debacle). Presupposing good faith on their part, the stated _design_ of Touch
ID is to prevent _even the fingerprint hash_ from being accessible to the OS
itself, let alone leave the device. All the fingerprint logic and stored
hashes runs on a logically distinct "secure enclave" and _it_ checks your
fingerprints and just returns "match" or "no match" back to the OS (as I
understand it).

Technical details here [https://www.quora.com/What-is-Apple’s-new-Secure-
Enclave-and...](https://www.quora.com/What-is-Apple’s-new-Secure-Enclave-and-
why-is-it-important?share=1) but there's a white paper out there somewhere
too.

If anything, this kind of set-up is what gives me some faith that Apple might
do self-driving cars correctly, rather than other manufacturers who think it's
somehow okay that the entertainment system runs on the same device that can
change driving parameters. Apple clearly needs to up their game too, but it's
clear that the possibility of hacking cars is a Bad Thing, and as cars get
more networked and more smart it seems clear that some car manufacturers do
not seem to have the in-house expertise capable of doing it responsibly, so I
wouldn't be surprised if a tech company actually ends up doing a better job
(whether that's Apple or Google or whoever).

~~~
ris
_faith_

All that you've said rests on this single word - pretty much everything you've
described is just taking Apple's word for it. I don't know where you get this
faith from. Yes, they _say_ they don't have any way into this "Secure Enclave"
from the OS.

We're living in a world where instructions passing through a processor can be
sniffed over GSM frequencies from metres away. You're telling me that not a
_single_ engineer at Apple, who knows the entire system inside out, can think
of any _possible_ way to get data from a device it is physically,
electronically connected to and communicates directly with? Not a _single_
obscure "debugging" mode was left in for convenience?

You have nothing but blind faith.

~~~
Osmium
I don't disagree with you (hence the upvote) but let's put this into context:
what are we worried about here? My fingerprints are easily obtainable by a
determined attacker. No question at all; I leave a trail of them around me
everywhere I go. What you mentioned being worried about is mass mining of
fingerprints–that hashes are being uploaded to some big database. The design
of the system is to prevent that. We'd know if Apple were wholesale uploading
fingerprints to its servers. There is no way that someone would not have
noticed that happening.

Note that the secure enclave is a _separate co-processor_ with its own memory.
It's secure even if the entire OS kernel is compromised.

> Each Secure Enclave is provisioned during fabrication with its own UID
> (Unique ID) that is not accessible to other parts of the system and is _not
> known to Apple_. [my emphasis] When the device starts up, an ephemeral key
> is created, entangled with its UID, and used to encrypt the Secure Enclave’s
> portion of the device’s memory space. Additionally, data that is saved to
> the file system by the Secure Enclave is encrypted with a key entangled with
> the UID and an anti-replay counter.

Note that for the 'rogue engineer' attack, you have to assume that other
people at Apple are either colluding with this person or incompetent. Which is
not impossible, but it's a little more than just blind faith. Note that the
secure enclave has existed for over two years now, since the A7 chip was
introduced, and we're yet to see an attack, and I'm sure it's not for lack of
trying. If there's a backdoor they're hiding it well, and what would they get
out of it anyway?

The white paper is here if you're interested:
[https://www.apple.com/business/docs/iOS_Security_Guide.pdf](https://www.apple.com/business/docs/iOS_Security_Guide.pdf)

------
msoad
Project Titan employees have a cover on their badges and pretty much nobody
have access to their buildings. I know two new employees who went to Project
Titan team that are heavily focused on computer vision.

~~~
untog
I spoke to someone who worked at Apple in the pre-iPhone era, he said similar
things about what ended up being the iPhone team.

It honestly just seems like a waste of time to me. That and the fact that I
never see Apple employees at conferences etc. - it makes me not want to work
there.

~~~
ttthrowaway
I really think that the purpose is of the secrecy is more a technique to keep
focus among engineers than anything else. Knowing more than one needs to know
leads to internal politics and discord. In a weird way Apple can really boast
of having "startup-like" teams inside it, because everyone knows exactly what
they need to do their job (engineers atleast).

~~~
untog
_Knowing more than one needs to know leads to internal politics and discord._

That seems optimistic at best. As the OP demonstrates, the secrecy leads to
gossip and rumours.

~~~
coldtea
Gossip and rumours don't matter. Internal politics can be about concrete
things, trying to influence this or that decision etc.

If you cannot even SEE or talk about their project with the members of the
other teams, that stops right there. Sure, you can rumour in the cafeteria
about it.

~~~
untog
Gossip and rumours affect morale, which absolutely matters.

~~~
coldtea
Apparently it works for Apple teams making multi-billion selling product after
product since 2002. So it probably doesn't matter that much.

Besides you get gossips and rumours also in normal, not secretive companies,
only there they get even more specific.

Here the rumours are mostly "wtf are they building?", not the bad kind to
have.

------
Gys
It probably requires an Apple Watch to open the doors, using your required
iPhone. The radio can only play Apple Music (subscription required). And do
not forget to register with iCloud, otherwise the car will deny your
ownership.

Not sure if am that much of an Apple fan to ever wanting to buy such car.
Probably would feel like literally giving up all freedom of choice.

~~~
veidr
I hate Apple and their shameless hypocritical promotion of corporate hegemony
over the individual human as much as the next guy, but come on.

There is no chance -- at all, whatsoever -- that Apple would release a car
that does any of the things you suggest. Sure, the Apple watch would open the
doors, and the entertainment system would integrate with Apple Music, and
iCloud would probably get a new feature called Find My Car.

But none of those things would be _required_ in any way.

~~~
arihant
Maybe not the other stuff, but I would probably not be surprised if Apple's
car _required_ an iPhone or Apple Watch to start. Now that they have NFC it
probably isn't a battery issue as well.

I'd actually be surprised if it is the other way around. The only way to kill
keys is to render them non-compliant.

~~~
2muchcoffeeman
Why would they possibly want to limit their customers to a subset of their
Apple Watch or iPhone customers? How is that advantageous for them.

If anything, they would build a car that is accessible to everyone, and have
better iDevice integration to push iDevice sales. Makes no sense to do it the
other way around.

~~~
arihant
Because when one is launching an already controversial, highly novel product
it benefits in unimaginable ways to start extremely to a limited few
customers. Let's see Apple's big, giant successes, and let's see how it
benefitted them.

1\. PC - Initially made for one particular store out of garage. It benefitted
them to focus on just that store, because it gave them a feel of exclusive
store without having one. Customers would come in, and buy there, because
there was no price comparison possible with other stores. With price
comparison came product comparison, and all PC companies as small as Apple
lost business because of that. This was also accidentally done as Apple got a
sizeable order from one single store, and they didn't have proper bandwidth to
deliver even that.

2\. Music - Initial iPod was Mac only. Steve mentions over and over in
documentaries and books that it was the only reason he could convince music
companies to let him sell music for $0.99 on iTunes. Too small a product, they
thought, for tiny Mac-only player, it would be a good publicity thing. Had
iTunes was a global platform from day one, it would be selling you full
albums, with a complimentary CD delivered to door. Shipping and handling
additional.

3.iPhone - AT&T only. And on this one people cried. But it helped Apple with
becoming the OTT king, because they could always say, there is not
propertization of telephony here, we only work with one carrier.

Self-driving cars will have a battle with a lot of authorities, in a lot of
countries. Nobody knows how many turtles exist in that cave. So it helps
starting small.

------
modeless
A self driving car seems untypical for Apple. The obvious model for self
driving cars is basically Uber without drivers; a service rather than a device
which you buy and own yourself. That seems more like a Google thing than an
Apple thing to me.

~~~
arihant
Apple's three big successes - personal computer, music, and phone. All seemed
very atypical of them too. In fact, self-driving cars is very similar to where
a PC was with the homebrew club.

~~~
mikeash
I get music and phone. But how was a PC atypical of Apple? It's what they were
founded for. It was their first product.

~~~
shawndumas
You are correct of course; Apple's first was a PC. But apropos of nothing,
Steve & Steve's first 'product' was blue boxes [1].

\-----

[1]:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_box](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_box)

------
mdaniel
The cited engineer's LinkedIn page[0] says that he worked for Lit Motors[1]
through Jan 2015, then nothing - which seems to square with my mental model of
Apple. The Lit Motors part piqued my interest since I'm a pre-orderer for
their awesome looking self-balancing enclosed motorcycle/vehicle. He even went
to the same university as I did, although for very different degrees.

0 = [https://www.linkedin.com/pub/frank-
fearon/16/687/3a0](https://www.linkedin.com/pub/frank-fearon/16/687/3a0) 1 =
[http://litmotors.com](http://litmotors.com)

~~~
kumarm
Wow Talk about secrecy, Linkedin Profile is already deleted.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Actually just an inaccurate cut & paste of the url
([https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=55419240](https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=55419240))
is still there, and you can see more of it if you log into LinkedIn

------
maggiechang5307
Here's what most people don't get about self-driving cars:

It's not the technology, it's the liability issues that have to be resolved
before self-driving vehicles really become feasible.

Can you imagine the corporate finger pointing and circle jerking that's going
to happen the first time somebody gets killed in an accident cause by a self-
driven vehicle?

And somebody is bound to get killed because there is no way possible to code
all of the possible scenarios that can happen on a road or guarantee 100% that
the hardware will function properly.

I have yet to hear an insurance company step up and state how they are going
to handle these issues.

It seems like a mess. I have a good driving record and enjoy pretty cheap
insurance rates ($25/month from Insurance Panda). I also enjoy taking my car
out for a spin and enjoying the ‘freedom’ of being able to drive anywhere.
Will the driverless car allow all this? If not, I’ll have to pass.

I've also haven't heard an insurance company step up and say they will insure
a self driving car. Until this happens all this talk about self driving cars
is really a non-starter.

~~~
coldtea
> _I have yet to hear an insurance company step up and state how they are
> going to handle these issues._

Well, if a company puts out a decent self-driving car will great commercial
opportunities, any smart insurance company will want to get a hand at that pie
(insuring its drivers).

From then, it's up to how good the car company can convince the insurance
company that their car will have an equal or less accident rate than a regular
car.

If the car company can show them that it has an equal accident rate, an
insurance company would be stupid not to insure it. And doubly stupid if the
car company could show the cars having a smaller accident rate.

So shouldn't be that difficult -- and far easier than also having to convince
the buying public.

~~~
whoiskevin
Why should I pay to insure a self driving car? I'm not driving it so maybe I
want personal protection but seriously the insurance changes entirely. If a
self driving car has to be insured by me then I want to control it not just
assume it works and I'll pay the insurance when it doesn't.

------
oroup
The Concord Naval Weapons Station where they plan to test:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concord_Naval_Weapons_Station](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concord_Naval_Weapons_Station)

On Google Maps: [https://goo.gl/maps/uOCwX](https://goo.gl/maps/uOCwX)

~~~
fernly
At least one Mythbusters episode has been filmed there. This one[1] for sure,
I think a few other driving-oriented ones. (However it is not the same as the
Alameda Naval Air station, a big open runway where they have done a number of
episodes including the recent "driving in reverse" episode.)

[1] [http://wikimapia.org/14471022/Mythbusters-Dirty-vs-Clean-
Car...](http://wikimapia.org/14471022/Mythbusters-Dirty-vs-Clean-Car-
Education-Episode)

------
coldtea
Cue some Google executive: _“We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here
figuring out how to make a decent self-driving car,” he said. “Apple guys are
not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.”_

(referencing Palm CEO's Ed Colligan’s remarks before the iPhone introduction).

------
trhway
My thinking is if Apple just did an electric iCar, they would already made a
killing, and they can do it tomorrow morning. All you need is design and good
supply logistics. No regulatory hassles to speak about, etc.. Self-driving car
is great, yet not tomorrow. Technologically iPhone wasn't like self-driving
car as there were phones+computer gadgets on the market before the iPhone, and
in that regard iPhone was just like a better electric car would be today. Main
innovation of iPhone was breaking back of cell provider - AT&T. Of course if
Apple can break the back of DMV and put the self-driving car through
regulatory hoops ... I will be so sorry to not have their stock :)

------
mtgx
> GoMentum Station’s empty roads feature everything from highway overpasses
> and railway crossings to tunnels and cattle grids. These would enable Apple
> to test vehicles in a variety of realistic everyday situations but without
> exposing it to scrutiny.

Has Apple ever heard of drones? They won't be able to hide this much longer if
they are testing it in the open.

~~~
arihant
It doesn't work that way. Vehicle companies test their secret products in open
all the time. The prototypes don't look much different from a standard market
product and are typically in coveralls. Even if you spot them on road they
would look like any other car company testing their car.

Just live near a car company and you'd see cars wrapped in black driving
around.

~~~
joezydeco
If Apple is testing their own drivetrain and (rumored) driverless system
outdoors they don't need to do it with Jony Ive sheet metal on it. It'll be
buried inside some generic minivan or sedan. You might be able to spy on the
testing but it will look like a Honda dealer training session.

~~~
CardenB
[https://www.google.com/search?q=apple+mapping+car&client=saf...](https://www.google.com/search?q=apple+mapping+car&client=safari&hl=en&prmd=iv&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0CAYQ_AUoAWoVChMImpr6y_-
txwIVwpoeCh1ibANt&biw=375&bih=559)

I feel as though not all these cars are just for mapping. LIDAR + cameras +
inconspicuous makes me think it could also be self driving

------
FaultierWheel
Lowly Worm had a self-driving Apple car ages ago (it must have been self-
driving... how else would a worm steer). REF
[http://bfy.tw/1Jdz](http://bfy.tw/1Jdz)

And the ubiquity of that design as a child's pedal toy is precisely what
should have some folks concerned.

Apple seems to have a long history of vendor lock on hardware components that
go in to their systems. I expect they view self-driving cars as a similar
opportunity -- for regulatory reasons they could push heavily for use of only
vendor-supplied parts, resulting in a tightly closed system. I would also
expect a limited number of models to enter the market each year -- just as we
see for Apple computer products.

Contrast that with vehicles like the Honda Civic and Ford F150, where there is
comparatively a large product range, and an even more enormous range of after-
market parts for repair and customization.

I suspect self-driving cars will reach a point of market saturation when they
become cheaper than human-driven cars, aided by vendors touting the extremely
high safety ratings and environmental protection value.

And when self-driving cars are here in force, I expect we'll actually see the
loss of ability to work on your own car that is decried today by folks who
advocate classic car technology over cars with computer systems.

Within our community the real question around self-driving cars should be the
ability to create an open platform, and whether this is a space that hobbyists
should be permitted to operate. Without this, we'll all be driving Lowly's
Apple car in a few years.

------
czottmann
I doubt they work on a _self-driving_ car. Electric: yes. But self-driving? I
am not sure how the Guardian came to that conclusion, other than looking at
the military facility that in the past was used to test self-driving vehicles
— _among other things_.

------
superuser2
The self-driving car will be transformative, and it's important that no one
company be the only game in town. If this seems like me-too-ism then it
probably is, but that's a good thing for the world.

------
na85
Probably the last company I would trust with my safety on the road.

~~~
freshyill
Ok, why?

------
Xorlev
If it's anything like Apple maps, we'll have death tolls in the thousands.

