Automobile automation and lifecycle: How digitalisation and security issues affect the car as a product and service?

Abstract

In this paper, we argue that to accommodate the change brought by autonomous and semi-autonomous cars, the current lifecycle model of a car should be re-assessed. Software security issues for vehicles are amplified significantly, as vehicles become more dependent on software and the driving process is transitioning towards autonomous operation. As vehicle automation levels increase and fully autonomous cars are already on public roads, the options for malicious parties to influence and harm traffic by hacking vehicles multiply, increasing risk levels of traffic. The magnitude of this issue is huge as most countries in Western world are dependent on the road travel, and the problem is a multidisciplinary one ranging from business, technology, and security to juridical, sociological, and ethical issues. We state that as the digitalisation and AI-based solutions take part to driving processes, we must start thinking cars more as a service and not as a standalone product. We argue that there should be more focus and further research on the issues of software maintenance and new software models to keep the roads safe from outdated and dangerous automated or semi-automated vehicles.