Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by janrinok on Sunday January 16 2022, @12:59AM   Printer-friendly
from the going-soon-from-outside-a-house-near-you dept.

Teen hacker finds bug that lets him control 25+ Teslas remotely:

A young hacker and IT security researcher found a way to remotely interact with more than 25 Tesla electric vehicles in 13 countries, according to a Twitter thread he posted yesterday.

David Colombo explained in the thread that the flaw was "not a vulnerability in Tesla's infrastructure. It's the owner's faults." He claimed to be able to disable a car's remote camera system, unlock doors and open windows, and even begin keyless driving. He could also determine the car's exact location.

However, Colombo clarified that he could not actually interact with any of the Teslas' steering, throttle, or brakes, so at least we don't have to worry about an army of remote-controlled EVs doing a Fate of the Furious reenactment.


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Snotnose on Sunday January 16 2022, @01:18AM (4 children)

    by Snotnose (1623) on Sunday January 16 2022, @01:18AM (#1213043)

    Is a script kiddie an IT researcher? What if s/he tweaks a line or three of a script, does that make them an IT researcher?

    I have trouble believing a teenager, especially an American teen, can qualify as an IT researcher. Don't get me wrong, s/he could be the second coming of Elon Musk. But I doubt it.

    For some background, back in the (300 baud) day I used to disassemble code on my TRS-80, and hang out on BBS systems. One day I got a message to call a certain phone number. I did. I was in the Montgomery Ward ordering system. No login, no password, if you knew that number you were in. I ordered myself a top of the line refrigerator, then cancelled it when they wanted a delivery address. I hung up then because A) I couldn't believe they were that naive; and B) I was renting an apartment and had nowhere to put a top of the line fridge.

    Did that make me an IT researcher? Aww hell no. The IT researcher in me was spending 8 hours disassembling game code to save me 1 hour of actually playing the damned game. That taught me more z-80 assembly than any number of books would have.

    Could I have ordered a complete living room and bedroom set of furniture, along with a TV, and gotten away with it? 90% sure now that I look back on it, but even 10% chance of no would have noped me right out. Which it did.

    --
    Why shouldn't we judge a book by it's cover? It's got the author, title, and a summary of what the book's about.
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +3  
       Insightful=2, Interesting=1, Total=3
    Extra 'Insightful' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   5  
  • (Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 16 2022, @05:13AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 16 2022, @05:13AM (#1213078)

    This kid is obviously brilliant and you are so resentful it's sad. You try to punch down the super genius kid, that is getting more attention than you because of his accomplishments, but fail epically.

    This prodigy hacked Elon Musks cars! I can tell from your post that you wish you were an IT professional, so that really makes you especially even more jealous because he's a famous IT researcher.

    Fine, be envious of gifted people like this teenager... but thanks to forward thinking security experts like this we can rest easier on the cyber-front.

  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 16 2022, @07:10AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 16 2022, @07:10AM (#1213082)

    The script kiddie found the bug and the IT researchers didn't.

  • (Score: 2) by Muad'Dave on Sunday January 16 2022, @12:49PM

    by Muad'Dave (1413) on Sunday January 16 2022, @12:49PM (#1213112)

    > I used to disassemble code on my TRS-80 ... That taught me more z-80 assembly than any number of books would have.

    Your teen years sound an awful lot like mine. I didn't have money to buy games to disassemble, so I wrote my own _in machine code_ by hand-generating the opcodes and data and poking them into RAM via a basic program. My GOD it was fast compared to basic!

    I still enjoy programming microcontrollers in assembly to this day.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 17 2022, @01:17PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 17 2022, @01:17PM (#1213379)

    > Is a script kiddie an IT researcher?
    At least as much as clowns that know only a subset of a group of DSLs and call themselves "full stack software engineers".