A widespread concern is what would happen to Dutch weapon systems if the Americans were to withdraw completely as an ally. For example, Dutch F-35 aircraft are dependent on American software updates. Yet, Tuinman isn’t particularly worried about this.
“The F-35 is truly a shared product. The British make the Rolls-Royce engines, and the Americans simply need them too.” And even if this mutual dependency doesn’t result in software updates, the F-35, in its current state, is still a better aircraft than other types of fighters.
If you still want to upgrade despite everything, I’m going to say something I should never say, but I will anyway: you can jailbreak an F-35 just like an iPhone. (Crack it with your own software, ed.)
imagine flying a jailbroken fighter plane that gets an over-the-air update that bricks the controls
just get the gripen
“ATTENTION! Your jet has been hacked by MilitaryGod Tech Team[LOL]. Your radios and controls have been disabled. Do not attempt to eject. Please send 10 bitcoin to wallet 214d93120cd3192ea019ab03928f1fa03 immediately to unlock your controls. If we do not receive payment in 15 minutes, all weapons onboard will be launched at nearby friendly targets. Thank you for your prompt attention to this urgent matter. Have a nice day!”
Something tells me fighter planes don’t get updates from anything other than a computer plugged directly into them.
That would seem like an awful idea that would be a dangerous security risk to the fighter.
So they probably did it anyway.
Well, let me be the one to surprise you and tell you that this is exactly how software and encryption keys are loaded onto the aircraft.
At no time would any combat aircraft have an operating system which even has the capability to receive software updates wirelessly, that would be an incredible vulnerability during wartime.
It requires a specific device that looks like it was made in the 1980s and deletes itself if it is bumped too hard and this device has to be directly connected to NSA controlled infrastructure in order to be loaded with any updates. The resulting material is loaded onto the device and physically carried by an Airman in the wing’s comm squadron and they are escorted by at least one other service member from the secure terminal where it was loaded directly to the aircraft.
It’s uploaded via internal connections (which may or may not look to be from the 80s) which are accessed by a maintenance hatch on the belly of the plane. Once the hatch is closed, if it is opened again at any point the aircraft will dump all of the key material and the resulting party will have a lot of paperwork and counseling to deal with and some other set of airmen will have to repeat the entire process all over again.
This has to be done for pretty much every flight, the aircraft cannot even start without this package of key materials and software. This process is fairly standard and used on a lot of equipment, as most equipment needs keying materials to function due to all of the datalink and/or telemetry systems.
It is likely that the Secretary of Defense was referring to their understanding of how this system operates and how they have scientists and engineers and the resources to reverse engineer any components. They have intact and working copies that they can tear apart and none of these systems are magic, they’re just secret and obtaining an intact war plane to reverse engineer is incredibly difficult in normal times. The Dutch have plenty of intact war planes to study.
In production since 2006 and of course they were designing the things earlier than that, so…
Wouldn’t be surprised if it’s like some cars of the late 90’s and early 00’s and you need a computer with an RS-232 port to connect to a multiplexer of some sort that connects to the plane
E.g to get full dealer level access to old Mercedes cars, you’d need one of these:
And a laptop with RS-232 running Windows XP (can be on a VM)
tbf, that can happen without jailbreaking
Can you elaborate on the Gripen?
Edit: my ore-coffee dyslexic ass read just like the Gripen.
I fully support Canada getting manufacturing here…
It’s a fighter jet. It’s made in Sweden. It costs about 80% in purchase price and 50% per flight hour compared to the f35. It’s not dependent on constant software updates.
I bet every modern fighter jet is. “Dependent” might not be the best word, but if you can make your existing jet better just by optimizing the software, then of course they should.
It’s probably true to say that F-35 is objectively better than a Gripen, but it’s way more expensive too. More Gripens might actually be better than fewer F-35s. My understanding is they’re more focused on electronic warfare.
Constant software updates is like one of the main features SAAB boasts on it lol
These mainly aren’t actually “engineer changes two lines of code” updates. These are actually more like internal database updates. Every time an F-35 or Gripen is flown, it generates data about itself and I believe also about the other planes it’s up against. This gets synced to other F-35s (or Gripens) for their future missions.
https://youtu.be/4Bbk-9kzMh4