
Self-driving cars can be disabled with a laser pointer and a Raspberry Pi - scoot
http://www.alphr.com/cars/1001483/self-driving-cars-can-be-fooled-by-fake-cars-pedestrians-and-other-bogus-signals
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ArcticCelt
Human-driven cars can also be disabled with a laser pointer to the eye of the
driver.

[http://www.livescience.com/21707-lasers-eye-
damage.html](http://www.livescience.com/21707-lasers-eye-damage.html)

~~~
mikeash
Human driven cars can also be disabled with funny sounds or women wearing
short skirts or a bit of spray paint on the road.

We really need to remember that humans are atrocious at driving on average,
and doing better than them is a pretty low bar. Not that we shouldn't strive
to improve automation, but don't let perfect be the enemy of the good.

~~~
krapp
Human drivers, on average, are not "disabled" by any of that. Distracted
momentarily, sometimes, perhaps, but not disabled - city driving is _replete_
with "bits of spray paint" and "funny sounds" and sometimes "women wearing
short skirts." On average, human drivers manage a great deal of complexity
without incident. We use the same visual acuity, adaptability and instincts to
negotiate traffic as we did millennia ago to avoid predators and survive our
climb up the food chain, and we're actually quite good at it, albeit obviously
not perfect. Human drivers are capable of not mistaking the reflections of
other cars _for other cars,_ and know the difference between a cardboard box,
a human being and another vehicle.

The bar is actually quite high, if you want to do better than humans _on
average_.

~~~
mikeash
Humans usually aren't disabled by that, but sometimes they are. How often is a
human distracted by one of these things, and before they can recover they
drive into an obstacle? It happens with great frequency.

And in this particular case, humans not only can be disabled with a laser
pointer, but they can be disabled _permanently_ , not just for that driving
session, but for the rest of their lives. Can't swap out cameras in a human
driver. Yet somehow this is not a crisis for manually-piloted cars.

~~~
krapp
> It happens with great frequency.

I doubt it happens that often, but I can't back that up with numbers, and I
can't be arsed to try.

But, humans can vary in their driving ability. In the case of autonomous cars,
you would have to assume any flaw in one is shared by all. The problem isn't
the laser pointers, or that humans can also be disabled by laser pointers, but
that autonomous cars aren't yet smart enough to deal with errant signals. If
all the autonomous cars can be stopped by an ever increasing list of simple
conditions that (with a couple of exceptions, like a laser pointer in the
eyes) wouldn't stop an average human driver, then it implies that the current
state of the art does not nearly live up to the hype.

~~~
mikeash
We can come up with a long list of simple conditions that wouldn't stop an
average computer but would stop an average human, too. For example, a computer
won't have any trouble driving for 48 hours without powering down, or with a
stinging insect in the cabin.

That's not to say that computers are superior to humans. It's quite clear that
the current state of the art in autonomous driving is way behind what humans
can do. My point is simply that comparing scenarios which one can handle and
the other cannot is not very informative.

------
djrogers
"Google, Uber and even Apple’s potential self-driving car can all be
foiled..."

So two cars that haven't even been seen in public yet - one of which might not
even exist - can be foiled by this technique?

Might be true, might not be - no way for anyone involved in this story to know
though. Is this really what passes for journalism now?

In fact, according to the article, this was never even tested on an actual
autonomous car's software - he just spoofed a commercial LIDAR system and
extrapolated from there.

~~~
archycockroach
"Ultimately, this latest car hacking is yet another signal that industries
usually disassociated from data security now need to start taking it
seriously."

Garbage.

------
scoot
_" Petit began by recording pulses from a commercial Ibeo Lux Lidar unit.
Discovering the pulses weren’t encoded or encrypted, he could simply use them
at a later time to fool the unit into believing objects were there when they
weren’t." _

That appears to answer my longstanding question as to what might happen when
multiple vehicles using lidar are on the road at the same time. (Pulse timing
notwithstanding of course, but given enough cars and enough time it could be
periodically problematic.)

However, regarding stopping a car with fake laser generated obstacles - that's
nothing that can't be done with real "obstacles". A roll of paper or aluminium
foil stretched across the road can't be discriminated from a solid object, and
a a few empty cardboard boxes are as good as concrete blocks to a self driving
car.

Or even just standing in the road yourself if you have sufficient faith in the
technology.

~~~
analog31
I suspect that the lidar signals could be modulated in the same way that cell
phone signals are, so that a population of cars can share a single laser
wavelength without confusing one another.

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Robdgreat
Ever since I first played Need For Speed 2, I've fantasised about a real-life
version of the ROADRAGE cheat code I could use to cause those doing the rest
of us on the road a disservice to flip over with a mere honk of my horn. We're
not there yet, but this is a clearly a step in the right direction.

------
jedberg
You can disable a human driven car the same way, and you don't even need the
Raspberry Pi.

------
redthrowaway
You don't need the Raspberry Pi to disable a human-driven one.

~~~
mirimir
Randomly pointing lasers at vehicles is a good way to get shot. Just sayin' ;)

~~~
chx
USA, baby, USA! Feel threatened? Answer with deadly force, it's the only way.

~~~
mirimir
Laser gun sights are very common in the US. So for some people, it's more than
just "feeling threatened". They're arguably too paranoid. And irresponsible.
But being right about that won't help if they shoot you.

------
chipsy
I remember how when laser pointers started proliferating there was a media
panic over their potential use in downing aircraft and blinding people.
Schools swiftly moved to ban them(I recall being in a few assemblies where
someone brought in a pointer and caused some mild, easily ignored disruption).

Regardless, the world hasn't blown up. You can still legally own a laser
pointer in most countries, subject to various power limits. The risks and
responsibilities involved in their use are real, but have to be weighed
against every other hazard.

------
andrewchambers
The police will crack down on you as hard or harder than if you just pointed a
laser pointer at human drivers. You can get very long prison sentences already
for doing this.

~~~
veb
They already do to people who do this to aircraft!

------
rfrey
Who needs a laser? Self driving cars can be disabled with a three dollar box
of roofing nails.

~~~
mikeash
Yeah, but at least they're immune to two-dollar boxes.

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JabavuAdams
Who did the industrial design on these cars? What's the target market?

I love the tech, and I love the goal, but I might refuse to ride in one of
these just because they look too retarded.

EDIT> This may seem frivolous, but I see it as a huge barrier to adoption. At
least make them look cool, not like preschool toys.

~~~
sigmar
>Who did the industrial design on these cars? What's the target market?

No one did the industrial design. It isn't a product, it is a prototype to
test a technology.

~~~
JabavuAdams
Right, but someone had to create that image, even if it's CG. The image itself
is a liability to the eventual product's marketing.

