
By Andy Greenberg, Wired.com, July 25, 2015 – WELCOME TO THE age of hackable automobiles, when two security researchers can cause a 1.4 million product recall.
On Friday, Chrysler announced that it’s issuing a formal recall for 1.4 million vehicles that may be affected by a hackable software vulnerability in Chrysler’s Uconnect dashboard computers. The vulnerability was first demonstrated to WIRED by security researchers Charlie Miller and Chris Valasek earlier this month when they wirelessly hacked a Jeep I was driving, taking over dashboard functions, steering, transmission and brakes. The recall doesn’t actually require Chrysler owners to bring their cars, trucks and SUVs to a dealer. Instead, they’ll be sent a USB drive with a software update they can install through the port on their vehicle’s dashboard.
Chrysler says it’s also taken steps to block the digital attack Miller and Valasek demonstrated with “network-level security measures”—presumably security tools that detect and block the attack on Sprint’s network, the cellular carrier that connect Chrysler’s vehicles to the Internet.