An Anonymous Coward offers the following:
Car owners and security experts can tinker with automobile software without incurring US copyright liability, according to newly issued guidelines that were opposed by the auto industry.
The Library of Congress, which oversees the US Copyright Office, agreed with fair use advocates who argued that vehicle owners are entitled to modify their cars, which often involves altering software.
Automakers including General Motors and other vehicle manufacturers such as Deere & Co opposed the rules. They said vehicle owners could visit authorized repair shops for changes they may need to undertake.
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Wired has published a long article about how the farming equipment manufacturer John Deere has just swindled farmers out of their right to repair their own equipment. Basically the manufacturer was allowed to write the agreement governing access to the firmware embedded in the farming equipment.
Farmers have been some of the strongest allies in the ongoing battle to make it easier for everyone to fix their electronics. This week, though, a powerful organization that's supposed to lobby on behalf of farmers in California has sold them out by reaching a watered-down agreement that will allow companies like John Deere to further cement their repair monopolies.
Farmers around the country have been hacking their way past the software locks that John Deere and other manufacturers put on tractors and other farm equipment, and the Farm Bureau lobbying organization has thus far been one of the most powerful to put its weight behind right to repair legislation, which would require manufacturers to sell repair parts, make diagnostic tools and repair information available to the public, and would require manufacturers to provide a way to get around proprietary software locks that are designed to prevent repair.
Motherboard also covered the topic about how farmer lobbyists sold out their farmers and helped enshrine John Deere's maintenance monopoly.
Earlier on SN:
The Right to Repair Battle Has Come to California (2018)
Apple, Verizon Join Forces to Lobby Against New York's 'Right to Repair' Law (2017)
US Copyright Office Says People Have the Right to Hack their Own Cars' Software (2015)
Jailbreak your Tractor or Make it Run OSS? (2015)
Digital Rights/Restrictions Management (DRM) technologies affecting new tractors are behind the continuing rise in popularity of the models. Particularly in the midwest, farmers are finding that 40-year-old tractors do the job with less trouble and expense.
Tractors manufactured in the late 1970s and 1980s are some of the hottest items in farm auctions across the Midwest these days — and it's not because they're antiques.
Cost-conscious farmers are looking for bargains, and tractors from that era are well-built and totally functional, and aren't as complicated or expensive to repair as more recent models that run on sophisticated software.
"It's a trend that's been building. It's been interesting in the last couple years, which have been difficult for ag, to see the trend accelerate," said Greg Peterson, the founder of Machinery Pete, a farm equipment data company in Rochester with a website and TV show.
Previously;
Reeducating Legislators on the Right to Repair (2019)
John Deere Just Swindled Farmers Out of Their Right to Repair (2018)
US Copyright Office Says People Have the Right to Hack their Own Cars' Software (2015)
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Nuke on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:00PM
“Sensitive vehicle data could be easily manipulated, altered, or distributed – undetected – if these changes are implemented,” [GM] said.
Manipulating and altering is nothing to do with copyright. An analogy - if I bought a book and cut some pages out, or wrote notes in the margins, it would not be infringing copyright.
Copying the original software in order to distribute it is a different matter as that would be infringing copyright; but you could do that without altering it so it is an orthogonal matter.
In any case, what are the car makers afraid of? They will still be selling every new car with the software present, and getting paid for it. If someone modifies their software to make the car less "green" or more dangerous, then again that is not a copyright issue. That's like my raising the suspension on my 4x4 (which I have in fact done, but safely).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VanderDecken on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:17PM
Despite outward appearances, I suspect it has less to do with real copyright issues and more to do with avoiding bad PR and forced recalls due to buggy, insecure, and *cough* misbehaving *cough* vehicle software. If you can sue security researchers (regardless of under what statute), problem solved, right?
The two most common elements in the universe are hydrogen and stupidity.
(Score: 2) by M. Baranczak on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:21PM
In any case, what are the car makers afraid of?
Good question - I don't know either. The guys who reprogram cars aren't competing with the manufacturers, because the manufacturers don't offer such a service. And people have always been modifying cars, so there's nothing fundamentally new here. The only explanation is that it's control for its own sake.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:21PM
People shouldn't buy cars that run proprietary software in the first place.
Automakers including General Motors and other vehicle manufacturers such as Deere & Co opposed the rules. They said vehicle owners could visit authorized repair shops for changes they may need to undertake.
These companies have disdain for the idea of users' freedoms being respected. With non-free proprietary software, you can only task "authorized" people to make the changes you want. With Free Software, you can task anyone to make the changes, you can make the changes yourself, or use the changes someone else already made; you have no masters. I have no reason to trust these "authorized repair shops" or the software the car makers developed.
Do not use software that does not respect your freedoms.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:35PM
> People shouldn't buy cars that run proprietary software in the first place.
Is your car pre-ECU (electronic control unit)?
I don't think there are enough cars left from before 1980 (approx start date of digital engine controls) to go around. At least not in the USA.
Now, in Cuba, where cars were next to impossible to import, they seem to have some 1950's cars still working.
(Score: 3, Touché) by M. Baranczak on Wednesday October 28 2015, @09:02PM
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 28 2015, @09:14PM
Do you have any practical suggestions?
Buy an extremely old car and campaign for car manufacturers to be forced to release their software as Free Software. Sorry if that doesn't sound easy and fun, but obtaining and keeping freedom is rarely easy.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mhajicek on Thursday October 29 2015, @05:40AM
No, PRACTICAL suggestions.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Thursday October 29 2015, @05:38AM
Is that Analpumpernickle?
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:25PM
Product control, avoidance of lawsuits, greedy bastards not wanting people to get their precious intellectual property (shitty software), or see the shady things they've done.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by frojack on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:31PM
This isn't a copyright issue, but rather a liability issue masquerading as a DMCA issue.
If GM protects their software via encryption (or just about any other method) and you hack your way through that protection you have technically violated DMCA. Hence the frikken Library of Congress, which was NEVER intended to be a regulatory agency now gets a say in what you do under the hood.
If you hack your car's software, and promptly crash the car, and try to sue, the automaker could still be held liable, even though you put in a subtle throttle boost adjustment into the code to get off the line faster. They want to outlaw that so that they don't have to retrieve the software from the crashed vehicle just to prove it wasn't their software, but rather yours.
Its the same mentality that is being used everywhere else these days. The government is the leader in this nonsense. The FCC wants to make it so can't hack your router just because you MIGHT hack the radio blob to wander into un-authorized frequencies. If there is a corner case SOMEWHERE that opens a possibility of an error in judgement causing harm, the knee jerk reaction is to ban even thinking about it.
So instead of worrying what copyright has to do with it, we should be asking WHY is it ok to hack a car, (where you can get someone killed), but not OK to hack a router where nobody outside of 90 foot radius will ever be bothered in the slightest.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by snick on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:49PM
That the spyware that they are building into today's cars will be disabled? That extra cost features that weren't paid for, and were turned off at the time of sale will get turned on?
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday October 29 2015, @02:25AM
That extra cost features that weren't paid for, and were turned off at the time of sale will get turned on?
Almost every option they charge you for is backed up by hardware items that aren't installed if you don't buy that package.
Parking assist requires sensors in the bumpers. Don't buy that, and not only are the sensors not installed but the wiring harness will not include the leads you need to add it later.
Don't want to pay for GPS NAV? Not only will it be missing from the dash, but the antenna will be missing and wiring harness will have no provision for it.
There is actually very few options that exist ONLY in the computers.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by davester666 on Thursday October 29 2015, @03:59AM
Because, technically, you can't "rip out a page" of the built-in program, and insert a page of your own. You have to make a copy of the built-in program [assuming you want to figure out how it works and/or restore the system to the original setup] and then replace it with your own.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday October 29 2015, @04:23AM
I've heard it alleged that there are so few manufacturers of engine and transmission computers that the software is somewhat standardized across many manufacturers. There are already many companies in the business providing "tunes" for all sorts of vehicles, from hot rods to trucks. Some of these simply change data in manufacturer's software tables that control shift points or fuel injection timing etc, other tunes replace significant parts of the code.
One poster here on SN pointed me to a third party open-ish source entire engine management software.
There are simply too many cars on the market for even Ford or GM to keep up with custom engine management for each model. It tends to be the the same computer and the same software with custom tables for each vehicle. And it tends to be supplied by just a few specialized companies. Bosch in the case of many German brands.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Thursday October 29 2015, @09:01AM
Because, technically, you can't "rip out a page" of the built-in program, and insert a page of your own. You have to make a copy of the built-in program [assuming you want to figure out how it works and/or restore the system to the original setup] and then replace it with your own.
Which, um, would mean it is not a "copy", it is a "replacement"? So absolutely no copyright violation involved. And more to the point, only altering my copy, which I can fold, spindle, or alterate to my heart's content without violating copyright, unless I sell copies at a profit! Remember that part of when copyright was a tort? Where there had to be some profit? Not just ripping a DVD or John Deere' diesel ECU? Oh what sad times we live in, where corporations can find such saps to defend the indefensible!
(Score: 2) by goodie on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:11PM
Heard it while driving home earlier, on the Spark program:
http://www.cbc.ca/radio/spark/297-the-future-of-food-farming-and-more-1.3275728/why-can-t-i-fix-my-tractor-1.3284537 [www.cbc.ca]
And this:
http://www.cbc.ca/radio/spark/297-the-future-of-food-farming-and-more-1.3275728/think-you-re-handy-around-the-house-not-in-the-future-you-re-not-1.3284613 [www.cbc.ca]
They mentioned this ruling at the end of the episode.
(Score: 2) by jummama on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:20PM
I think the NHTSA should require that researchers are allowed to access the source code itself, as it's a lot easier to analyze this way and find issues like Emission test detection routines, or unreliable throttle control threads. As it stands, with this exemption, a year from now (!?), you can feel free to poke and prod at that black box of a PCM/ECM and disassemble the code if you can find the appropriate tools, and apply binary patches, or modify the various tables that it runs from, again, assuming you can find the appropriate tools and/or documentation to figure out where those are at in the blob.
At the least there should be some kind of specific NDA for this that can be signed by any willing researcher, whereby they have full access to the source code, but not the right to redistribute the source or derived binaries, while still allowing them to disclose any issues they find.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 28 2015, @08:24PM
I think the NHTSA should require that researchers are allowed to access the source code itself, as it's a lot easier to analyze this way and find issues like Emission test detection routines, or unreliable throttle control threads.
Why just researchers? Then it would still be infringing upon the users' freedoms. They should be forced to release all their software as Free Software, if anything. Unless they are forced to do so or do so voluntarily, no one should use cars that require using proprietary software.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday October 28 2015, @09:13PM
I'm a "researcher". You call me "backyard mechanic". I own it, and I want it to do more, or less, or something different than the manufacturer designed it to do. I'm "researching" it. Why should some select researchers be permitted to access the code, if I can't?
NDA's? Why should any researcher be required to sign an NDA? You cannot justify silencing or censoring anyone with an NDA.
(Score: 2) by jummama on Wednesday October 28 2015, @09:56PM
Optimally, all the ECU code would be just GPL or BSD in the first place so that it's not an issue.
NDA is the only way I can realistically imagine the car manufacturers allowing any sort of source code access though, and my thought with that is for it to only prevent derivative binaries, and to prevent someone from dumping the whole thing on GitHub or something, while still allowing researchers to release info about vulnerabilities, or to assist others in a clean-room implimentation a-la the original IBM BIOS.
An attempt at a pragmatic solution to an ugly industry is all I'm trying to get at there. There's no way GM/Ford/Chrystler/Honda/Toyota/etc would just release BSD code for their ECUs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 29 2015, @12:12AM
In researching my reply , I came across this: Open Source IoT Code Is Not The Entire Answer [blogspot.ca].
I was going to point out that the automakers are probably using proprietary code modules that they are not allowed to disclose. (Much like doom was released under the GPL without the music playing code)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 29 2015, @12:29AM
Open source isn't good enough. It must be Free Software. Anything else is intolerable. And just because Free Software bugs and exploits aren't always found doesn't mean that it isn't better than non-free proprietary software on the security front. Of course, at the end of the day, freedom is what matters most.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 29 2015, @01:02AM
From one AC to another ...
The big car US/Euro/Japan companies are not going to release or GPL their code and they are going to defend as much as possible against anyone reverse engineering their code (including the distasteful business of lobbying politicians).
The long term problem/enemy that they see is China, India and other rising economies -- where there are a dozen or two car companies that are growing rapidly and are already competing with the established car companies in some markets.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 29 2015, @02:01AM
Well, then we should refuse to use their cars and campaign for laws that will force them to release their software as Free Software. I am usually not in favor of forcing this (though I refuse to use proprietary software), but it is clear that having a car is unavoidable in many people's cases.