Month: October 2017

Vulnerable Vehicles – Connected cars and their security issues

~ Christian Trendli

In times of the continuing Internet-of-things- and connectivity-hype, a connected variant of “the German’s favourite toy” cannot be absent. Modern cars, SUVs and lightweight trucks come with all kinds of connected features, from smartphone interface integration up to social media in the navigation system. But what about the security of these features? Is there a way to compromise them? And what could be possible results of a remote exploitation? This blog post gives an overview about the current state of research in terms of connected car security and shows us some problems, which could be live threatening to some extent.

The automotive industry finds itself a bit between the devil and the deep blue sea at the moment. Besides record turnovers and economic success, the manufacturers are faced with some serious challenges. Dieselgate, alleged cartels, general antitrust issues and massive pressure from the governments due to legislations and the push of new drive concepts are only a short summary of the problems the whole industry has to deal with.

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Usable Security – Users are not your enemy

~ mw195

Introduction

Often overlooked, usability turned out to be one of the most important aspects of security. Usable systems enable users to accomplish their goals with increased productivity, less errors and security incidents. And It stills seems to be the exception rather than the rule.

When it comes to software, many people believe there is an fundamental tradeoff between security and usability. A choice between one of them has to be done. The belief is – make it more secure – and immediately – things become harder to use.

It’s a never-ending challenge – security and usability experts arguing about which one is more important. And some more people of the engineering and marketing department get involved giving their views and trying to convince the others. Finding the right balance between security and usability is without a doubt a challenging task.

The serious problem: User experience can suffer as digital products become more secure. In other words: the more secure you make something, the less secure it becomes. Why?
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