SwRI investigates cybersecurity weaknesses in transportation management systems

Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), in San Antonio, has been awarded a $750,000 (£573,000) contract from the Transportation Research Board to help state and local agencies address cyber-attack risks on current transportation systems and those posed by future connected vehicles. Cyber security firm, Praetorian will support SwRI by conducting a security audit of traffic management systems and develop a web-based guide to help transportation agencies learn how to safeguard equipment.
November 6, 2017 Read time: 2 mins

Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), in San Antonio, has been awarded a $750,000 (£573,000) contract from the Transportation Research Board to help state and local agencies address cyber-attack risks on current transportation systems and those posed by future connected vehicles. Cyber security firm, Praetorian will support 588 SwRI by conducting a security audit of traffic management systems and develop a web-based guide to help transportation agencies learn how to safeguard equipment.

SwRI’s assessment will include white hat hacking (penetration testing) to assess vulnerabilities and recommend mitigation strategies. These recommendations will also consider how agencies with limited resources can implement cybersecurity measures.

For future research, SwRI will evaluate potential access points where hackers could exploit connected vehicles. Government agencies and the automotive industry are preparing vehicles and transportation infrastructure to include more wireless networking to enable safer driving with vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communications.

Figures revealed from the institute show that more than 400,000 traffic signal systems across the United States have varying levels of network access and embedded security. System managers and government stakeholders may be unaware of cyber risks to controllers, dynamic message signs, road-weather information systems, and other devices that relay data.

Daniel Zajac, SwRI engineer and principal investigator, said: “The goal is to create security guidance for traffic management centres,”

IT and security personnel need to understand threats to their equipment, standards for managing passwords, and then move up to advanced network security.”

Classification & Data Collection Urban Traffic Control

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Tighten up on cyber security before hackers infiltrate ITS infrastructure
    October 19, 2015
    This year’s ITS World Congress in Bordeaux will have three sessions dedicated to cyber security and the issue will also be addressed under connected and automated vehicles categories. Jon Masters finds out why. American security researchers Charlie Miller and Chris Valasek attracted international press coverage recently when they demonstrated how they could hack into and take control of a vehicle from a remote laptop. While the implications are clearly serious for vehicle manufacturers, highway and transpor
    Read More
  • Don’t forget security threat, says Econolite
    May 6, 2020
    A new level of communication is helping deliver on the promise of Vision Zero and a more sustainable future. But amid the promise, Econolite’s Sunny Chakravarty suggests we need to be mindful of the potential downsides in an age of mass connectivity
    Read More
  • The rise of V2X: it’s time for ITS to put up the shields in cyberspace
    May 14, 2018
    Traffic management has largely been shielded from the sort of malicious hacking that is commonplace in other industries – but with billions of connected devices in the world it won’t stay that way, warn internet experts Keith Golden and Brandon Johnson. Traditionally isolated from networks and the internet over most of its history, the traffic management industry has largely been shielded from malicious hacking and system intrusion that have become commonplace in other industries. However, as the rate of
    Read More
  • SafeRide: it’s time to act on cyberattacks
    May 10, 2019
    Cyber threats are increasing rapidly and conventional security measures are unable to keep up. Ben Spencer talks to SafeRide’s Gil Reiter about what OEMs can do now As more vehicles become connected, so the potential threats to their security increase. Gil Reiter, vice president of product management for security firm SafeRide, says the biggest ‘attack surface’ for connected cars is their internet connectivity - and the in-vehicle applications that use the internet connection. “The most vulnerable co
    Read More

Highlighted Content