The last month has seen the subject come to the fore as car buyers express their concerns over the security of driverless cars whilst a list of the 20 most hackable cars was also released.

In response, the September/October issue of the FLEETSolutions magazine includes an article on "Car Hacking – Preparing For The Future Now", which goes in-depth with the subject that motor vehicles are now literal computers on wheels, and are open to the same cyber threats as PCs, tablets, or smartphones are.

‘The scariest thing about researching the story and conducting the interviews was learning how far along we are,’ said Donald W Dunphy, the writer of the article. ‘Under the right conditions, the capability is here now. It's the cost of making it happen that is preventing it from happening at scale. That's why it is important that fleet professionals look at this inevitability with clear eyes.’

The article, part of an ongoing series for the magazine dealing with recognizing and averting crises in fleet, brings insight to the topic, thanks to perspectives from Charlie Miller, a security engineer at Twitter; Chris Valasek, director of security intelligence at the Seattle consultancy IOActive; Johan Sys, managing principal for identity and access management, Verizon; Stefan Savage, professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of California, San Diego; and Patrick T Barrett, CAFM, Director of University of Nebraska Transportation Services and chair of NAFA's Education Development Committee.

‘What really caught me was that, when going into the article as I imagined so many would, I thought the big fear would be terrorism,’ Dunphy said. ‘The truth is far more mundane but nonetheless insidious. Vehicle theft, unfair competitive tactics, and plain vandalism are all more likely, and considering that these occur on a daily basis even without the 'genie-in-the-bottle' of car computer hacking, the concern should be real for everyone who has dealings with motor vehicles.’

FLEETSolutions, NAFA’s official magazine, published bi-monthly, contains in-depth stories designed to educate, inform, and facilitate fleet managers to excel in their jobs and is an exclusive benefit of being a NAFA member. 

‘NAFA's FLEETSolutions is committed to bringing those subjects to light for fleet professionals,’ said NAFA chief executive officer Phillip E Russo. ‘NAFA believes it is our responsibility to dig and learn, no matter what, and we do that with every issue.’