Securing Software Updates for Automotives Using Uptane

Does secrecy improve security or impede securing software updates? The automotive industry has traditionally relied upon proprietary strategies developed behind closed doors. However, experience in the software security community suggests that open development processes can find flaws before they can be exploited. We introduce Uptane, a secure system for updating software on automobiles that follows the open door strategy. It was jointly developed with the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI), and the Southwest Research Institute (SWRI), with input from the automotive industry as well as government regulators. We are now looking for academics and security researchers to break our system before black-hat hackers do it in the real world—with possibly fatal consequences.