Norway: Chinese-made electric buses have major security flaw, can be remotely stopped and disabled by their manufacturer in China, Oslo operator says
The public transport operator in Norway’s capital said Tuesday that some electric buses from China have a serious flaw – software that could allow the manufacturer, or nefarious actors, to take control of the vehicle.
Oslo’s transport operator Ruter said they had tested two electric buses this summer – one built by China’s Yutong and the other by Dutch firm VDL.
The Chinese model featured a SIM card that allowed the manufacturer to remotely install software updates that made it vulnerable, whereas the Dutch model did not.
“We’ve found that everything that is connected poses a risk – and that includes buses,” Ruter director Bernt Reitan Jenssen told public broadcaster NRK.
“There is a risk that for example suppliers could take control, but also that other players could break into this value chain and influence the buses.”
Ruter said it was now developing a digital firewall to guard against the issue.
According to other reports, the Chinese manufacturer has access to each bus’s software updates, diagnostics, and battery control systems. “In theory, the bus could therefore be stopped or rendered unusable by the manufacturer,” the company said.
Ruter has reported its findings to Norway’s Ministry of Transport and Communications.
Arild Tjomsland, a special advisor at the University of South-Eastern Norway who helped conduct the tests, said: “The Chinese bus can be stopped, turned off, or receive updates that can destroy the technology that the bus needs to operate normally.”
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How are we China’s enemy? We’re the ones suddenly trying to nationalize companies like Nexperia. When did China do something like this? Obeying leader Trump in 5% military expenditure isn’t exactly being independent either.
@Socialism_Everyday@reddthat.com
What an absurdly flawed argument. China never did something like that simply because a foreign company is legally banned from owning its own Chinese subsidiary in the first place. You always need a Chinese partner that would then own the majority of “your” company.
I’m answering to the comment about “becoming their enemy by being independent”. I’m asking for evidence of China choosing Europe as its enemy, as I genuinely haven’t seen such hostile acts unless in retaliation from Europe choosing to suddenly become China’s enemy.
Well no, America chose to became China’s enemy, and Europe is following them as they have since WWII.
Hi! Person with knowledge of doing business in China as a “western company”. You start up your company and hire Chinese engineers. After a while many of them will quit and instead work for a newly created company across the street that do the exact same thing as you do (soon to be “did”).
Huh, I thought we loved free market competition in Europe. If you can’t keep your workers or compete against another firm, by market logic your business isn’t efficient and shouldn’t exist.
You’ve never held a job, correct? It would be difficult to explain not understanding “company secrets” otherwise.
I work in public research, where knowledge is, well, published, i.e. made public so that it benefits everyone. I’m in principle aganst intellectual property. Regardless: if you believe intellectual property is being violated there are laws against that.
… the takeaway I expected people to get from my post was that no, in China your IP and your business secrets are not respected and you have no recourse when it happens.
Do you often believe yourself to know everything on all subjects?
And what prevents you from doing the same then
As someone who has also experience of doing business in China as a “Western company”: Yes, that’s exactly the way it is.
Bill Gates and Apple. Both are shit business models, but this isn’t a “Chinese specific” thing.
You do realise that China defined ‘restricted’ industrial sectors where foreigners at most can form a joint venture with a Chinese company which must own more than the foreign one? We granted far more liberties to the Chinese than the other way round.
That still doesn’t respond to my initial question of when China has designated Europe as its enemy, which is why I brought up the particular event of escalation of economic warfare that Europe decided to engage in this very week.
You can call it “enemy”, you can call it “rival”, or whatever you like: China views itself as in competition with us and hence will naturally try to shift things in their favour. Which is completely fine by me, that’s just how it goes if you want to be a major power. But we shouldn’t pretend that our interests, i.a. a strong Europe, is China’s interest. Because it isn’t.
Economic rival in competition =/= warfare, which was the comment above the thread. The context was conflict
Rivalry isn’t limited to the economic domain. We are also political rivals as they oppose democracy and our open societies. We are geopolitical rivals when it comes to their desire to invade Taiwan or their ongoing support of the aggressor behind the largest war in Europe since WW2. All this could eventually lead to warfare, so we ought to be prepared.
And we don’t? I’m a Spaniard and in my country we have literal political prisoners and exiles because we are violating the human right to self determination with Catalonia. Greece voted for the revision of sovereign debt in referendum and the Troika came in to threaten them with kicking them out of the Euro if they enacted the democratic will of the people. Berlin had a referendum to cap rent prices but it was declared illegal by a judge. Emmanuel Macron skipped congress to rise the retirement age using emergency powers, and when millions of protests ensued, the government did nothing. All of Europe is rising military expenditure to 5% of GDP regardless of party elected, except possibly Spain (unconfirmed). All of Europe simultaneously adopts austerity policy since 2008, regardless of country or party elected, and the EU literally will sanction your country if you avoid it by having more deficit than centrally and antidemocratically established. None of this points to democracy.
I don’t recall voting for the rise of interest rates during the inflation crisis of 2022, or for the rise of GDP expenditure to 5%, have you voted for either of those things? How about we get off our high horse of European supremacy and we start looking at the reality: the threat in Europe is inside. We have far right parties dominating the political spectrum everywhere or about to do so, we are supporting the genocide of Palestinians, and we are following the lead of fucking Trump while he openly declares intentions to militarily annex Greenland.
Are we geopolitical rivals when it comes to Taiwan’s desire to invade mainland China? The Republic of China also declares itself the rightful government of all Chinese people and declares its intents to rule over all of China. Should we start sanctioning TSMC?
Our systems obviously aren’t perfect, but no, we don’t oppose democracry. You can vote, you can speak up. you have an independent legal system. You can criticise all these shortcomings here without having to live in fear or being censored. Try that in China. If you don’t want to see the qualitative difference between that, I can’t help you.
We don’t vote for interest rates, as they are set independently by central banks. But yes, I’ve voted for parties that argued for increased military spending. I oppose Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine (and China’s explicit complicity in it) and I want us to be prepared.
It’s been more than 30 years since Taiwan did that last. As of today, most Taiwanese consider themselves Taiwanese instead of Chinese and since approx. 10 years, the ruling parties aim for Taiwanese independence, i.e. no affiliation with China at all. The only party enforcing the “One China Principle” and at all costs trying to prevent the idea of Taiwan and hence keeping the conflict alive is the PRC who still harbours its imperialistic plans of conquest - and ramps up their military accordingly.
Reality distortion field is real.
Yeah, you can vote the colour of the party that will apply austerity policy against the peoples’ will. Surely the Chinese being the most satisfied with their government in the world is just because they’re all a brainwashed hivemind?
In Europe you can speak up… and be unheard. What is the point of speaking up if nobody listens?
So democratic. Millions of people in the EU struggling to pay ruddenly higher mortgages because the central bank decided antidemocratically that raising interest rates is good
The weapons you’re happily investing in will, browsing history, end up being used for shit like bombing Libya or Yugoslavia, going to war in Iraq, or being given to Israel to commit genocide of Palestinians. Let’s spend trillions in weapons while the far right rises to power in all of Europe and during an EU-supported genocide in Palestine, what a wonderful idea!
The point, regardless of my opinion, is it doesn’t matter if you voted in favour of military spending. Every country in EU, regardless of party in charge, decided to weaponize. How does that point towards democracy? You may believe that empowering Rheinmetall, a literally Nazi company, is a good political decision, but the point is that this decision was made regardless of your support or anyone’s.
Yet the country is still Republic of China and not Taiwan, and declares ownership of mainland China. How democratic of them!
What’s the last war in which China has been directly involved? Furthermore, as a European, why do you care more about China’s attitude towards Taiwan than about the US directly saying it wants to militarily invade Greenland? Surely China has no right to have concerns about US military bases in Taiwan and US military boats patrolling the strait of Taiwan.