With all the news going out about hackers and thieves, it is quite timely that United States Senator Ed Markey, from Massachusetts, calls for the improvement and development of car security when it comes to hackers and remote attacks. He sent an open letter to 20 different car brands and manufacturers to make sure that their vehicles are well protected from cyberattacks.

According to Senator Ed Markey, the big names in car manufacturing should lead the charge in developing secure vehicle systems. Names like Ford, Subaru, Mazda, Honda, Audi, Chrysler, and BMW come up, just to name a few. They should be taking a closer and deeper look into the matter since the vehicles of today have a lot of incorporated computing systems that hackers could easily take advantage of. As we advance in technology, so is the hacker’s ability to compromise computing systems.

Furthermore, Senator Markey emphasized that the modern vehicle has at least 50 individual electronic control units, or known as ECUs, which is controlled by a certain controller area network (CAN). With these components, we are talking about the car’s functionality, privacy, and safety while on the road. If these ECUs get compromised in any way, we are talking about a very big problem.

In light of this concern, the government, specifically the White House, funded a study that will look into this matter much closely. The goal of the study is to find out how hackers could have an impact on a certain vehicle. It’s about finding out the vulnerabilities of the system in order to prevent further damage. You might be surprised about the results of the test. The car model for the study was a Toyota Prius. After getting in the system and accessing the dashboard of the car, they were able to find out how the hackers will be able to control the vehicle. Surprisingly, hackers will be able to turn off the engine while the car is running, and they are also able to lock the steering column so that the drive won’t be able to steer safely. These results were alarming.

The main entry point for the hackers would be the Bluetooth link that is quite common in modern vehicles today. The car’s central computer was remotely accessed by sending an infected SMS to any paired device.

These days, many vehicles also has self-parking capabilities and you can just imagine what happens if this system was compromised as well. If hackers will be able to access this system, they will be able to control the vehicle remotely and let it do whatever they please. Again, you only see this on television but it’s really getting close to reality.

Hackers are getting wiser as technologies evolve and that is why you should be able to protect yourself from them. If a car can be hacked, so is your personal computer and other devices. By using a VPN service provider, you are ensured that the hackers won’t be able to see you when you go online. Stay anonymous. Stay safe. With Faceless.me VPN, your connection will be encrypted and this means you are protected.