Staring this 2015 model year, cars will come equipped with internet and WiFi capabilities.

Here I am sitting outside a friend’s house in suburbia; I could connect to the houses around me.

You’ll soon be connecting your car to your home network to update it. Only ever connect your car to a known, safe network, like your home, and never a public network, like a coffee shop.

* = password

The Attack

You connect the car via a coffee shop > an attacker inside has MITM’d the connection > now all internet traffic runs through his computer first, before going to the internet

The Defence

Connect only to a network you fully control, like your home.

While this is unlikely to happen…

… that’s only for now. While car hacking is still in its infancy, now is the time to form good habits, because it only takes one connection, one time, to tank it all.

(see: ‘Keri on Driving’ column Dispelling Car Hacking Fears, and the lead press piece I wrote for last year’s SecTor Security Conference)

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Further reading:

– how to secure your car’s internet connection

– my column: WiFi HotSpots are coming to Cars

– what is a MITM attack

– general WiFi security