Google Launching Fleet of Driverless Cars - Here Is Why You Should Be Concerned

TechCrunch reported this week that Google has arranged for Uber, a controversial mobile app company that schedules limo rides for people (as an alternative to traditional taxi cabs), to purchase a fleet of 2500 self-driving cars that Google will manufacture.



Uber-connected drivers have been cited for violations of local codes at the San Francisco International Airport but the service claims it is not a traditional taxi company. Now, as part of the deal with Google (which recently made an extensive investment in Uber), Uber will be moving more fully into the taxi industry. The company claims that few of its current 50,000 associated drivers around the world will be affected by the deal.

Google's driverless cars have been approved for developmental use in three states and the District of Columbia. But the vehicles, which have now reached their third generation of prototype development, may represent one of the largest security threats to public welfare and safety to emerge from Internet-derived technologies.

You can read the scientific assessment of the threat from Google driverless cars but the short version of the story is that these computer-controlled vehicles are being promoted and developed without any apparent safeguards against being hacked.

Although it might be extremely unlikely that terrorists or criminals would pack the vehicles with explosives, they may be able to hack into the vehicles' computer systems and use them for a variety of purposes, including holding people hostage, creating traffic jams, driving vehicles into crowds of people, running blocker for bank robberies and other crimes, disrupting public utilities, and distributing malware to other computer systems.

State and Federal lawmakers have yet to acknowledge the incredible power that a swarm of thousands of computer-controlled vehicles traveling American streets without any direct human oversight and intervention would possess. The maintenance facilities for these vehicles might have zero security procedures in place. As the number of driverless vehicles on the roads increases, the potential for hackers to transfer botnet technologies (which have already compromised millions of computers over the past 15 years) to roving networks of self-driven vehicles grows significantly.

Without proper legislation mandating clear and transparent oversight and remote management of these fleets of vehicles -- including designating appropriate powers to civil engineering and law enforcement agencies to take control in times of crisis -- a growing fleet of driverless cars poses a serious threat of enormous magnitude to the public welfare.
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