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votes
Subaru cars phone home to 3G cellular network that no longer exists - drains battery
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- Title
- Tell HN: 3G sunsetting is remotely killing every Subaru Outback battery | Hacker News
- Word count
- 161 words
That's wild. I assume this will only get worse as car companies add insane things like subscriptions to their cars.
"I'm sorry, you can no longer sub for that heated steering wheel because we shut down the servers."
So far I have never owned a car with its own internet connection. With the functionality of my phone, possibly a dedicated gps device, I don't see the need. Thanks to articles like this, I now actively don't want my car to connect to anything outside itself. We will see what options I find in future years but I am very happy with my old car right now.
Oh boy... you may not have seen it but there was a DEFCON talk about Chrysler cars with the onboard WiFi. They didn't dig deep into what was possible once the vehicle got hacked into (because its hard) but they were able to show 2 methods of attack, one was attacking the WiFi password which looks complex but (at the time) there were only a few hundred possible passwords. The other attack IIRC was basically exploiting the fact that there was no firewall between the car and the cell network.
The researchers disclosed this properly to Chrysler but they didn't patch it until AFTER the researchers publicly disclosed the vulnerabilities.
My current car is from before 2005, so I'm not impacted yet.
Do you have any recommendations on where to read into that?
I should have just included the video in the other post. They have their twitter accounts linked in the description but I don't know where to find the paper they wrote.
I rewatched part of it and the scope of their hack was beyond what I remember. They were able to control the brakes, transmission, and steering wheel. They did need to reflash it with custom firmware to do that but they were able to do that over the cell network.
Something to note for future people considering this: I think this could affect gps signal in android auto/carplay. I am almost positive about this, but I could be misremembering. Many CarPlay/aa head units allow the phone to use the GPS antenna built in the car. Since those antennas are larger, faster, and not stuck in a metal box, the gps can be much more precise and reliable. I doubt this would change your mind, but it’s something to consider. And if your car has the option of disconnecting the cellular antenna and leaving the GPS antenna, that might be a good idea.
IIRC from reading forum posts about this, the cellular and GPS antennas have separate connections at the head unit, so you can disconnect cellular without affecting GPS (or AM/FM radio; the external wifi antenna is probably in that same unit, as well).
This probably varies widely by make and model.
That's fair. I definitely would be very skeptical of OEM manufacturers.
I do own a Tesla, but since one of their key selling points is frequent over the air updates I'm not too worried about their internet connection suddenly disappearing one day. That and their incentive is to collect driving data, etc.
This actually brings up an interesting situation about Tesla and other vehicles. This isn't a software issue that can be fixed OTA, this is a hardware issue. These Subarus have 3g radios, and 3g is no longer supported by cellular carriers. That's not something you can fix OTA, that's a hardware replacement that Subaru is apparently not going to support. A quick google search seems to indicate that Tesla vehicles are still being built with 4g radios, not 5g. It also shows a hypothesis of 2030 for the sunset of 4g (no official announcements). So we'll have to see what Tesla will do in ~7 years.
True enough. Tesla's go beyond most cars with the connectivity which include various entertainment apps, other features, etc. While we don't know what will happen, you could argue it would be even worse if they suddenly lost the ability to connect to the internet. They are still a company so I have no reason to trust that they will "do the right thing" so definitely something to watch.
My new car has 4G LTE equipped in the car, but it's a subscription service we can pay for or turn off. I have no idea if it's able to be upgraded if/when 4G LTE goes away. I assume, like all other computers, this one will either need to be massively updated/upgraded, or I'll need to upgrade the car lol. We have it for free now, but we plan on cancelling it when it comes time to start paying for it since in the two weeks we've had the car, we haven't used the wifi once.
For a lot of software, you can spin up a local web server and lie to outdated software. Is there a way to do that on these networks?
This is cell network, you would have to make 3G cell in your car (which is possible but probably very costly while also illegal) and only then you would needto setup some server to lie to the car. Or.mybe it can be done via wired connection somehow.
Or Subaru could have called the cars in and equipped them with new 4G modems... But that costs money.
You can buy cell phone boosters which are exactly that, a mini cell phone tower. Mostly used in rural areas, but they are either a repeater that has a directional antenna you point at the nearest tower or a tunnel that relays over an Internet connection.
A booster won't convert 4 or 5G to 3G, though
My point was that low power micro cell towers are commercial available for consumers. They aren't illegal to own and are relatively cheap.
Not an expert, but I would definitely assume so. There is absolutely no reason Subaru could not have come up with a solution. I assume they just didn't want to because it would cost money.
Does that help if the car is moving?
law firm request for potential plaintiffs vs Suburu
Hey all, after suffering some major battery drain and investigating I'm back with some answers!
We're on our second battery for our 2016 Outback. After the first died I read about all the problems and replaced the OEM one with a higher capacity model (can't really remember the specs offhand, sorry). This was about 1.5 years ago.
We've now started experiencing problems again, so I did some more digging after reading this article.
First I found this reddit post which has a lot of great discussion about the core problem.
Then I found this class action suit. More great info if you choose to go the "official service" route.
I was nervous enough about the potential to be ignored and/or charged ~$1000 that I chose not to go with official service.
I then found this product page that provides a bypass module (scroll down to Option 2).
While searching for how to dismantle my dash to install this new module (I wanted to understand what I was getting into before dropping $80), I found this other video with a cheaper and simpler fix that still might work.
I'm currently trying out the last option to see how well it works, and will try to report back.
Reporting back with some mixed news. I think the fix worked, but unfortunately my battery was already so damaged that it was still having trouble starting the car on cold days. So I ended up buying a new one and all seems pretty good so far.
Additionally, I got a letter from Subaru that extended my warranty for a year to make repairs to the DCM and replace battery if needed. So I guess I'll be scheduling an appointment at the dealership to further future proof the vehicle.
I own a 2017 Outback and have had 1 battery replacement and several mornings where I needed to jump start it. I have been following this thread in the hopes that someone will post a guide for how to disable this. Anyone else had any luck? I did read the fuse pulling idea, but I'd rather not disable a bunch of other stuff in the car. Has anyone been successful at disabling just the 3G module/antenna?
It has been a long time since I read the site, but I used to participate over here when I had an Outback:
https://www.subaruoutback.org
You might find good answers there. I find vehicle specific forums to be the best place to answer questions about my specific vehicle.
If I were in your shoes, I would check other sources also, possibly consult with a mechanic. Tildes is a small community. Good luck!
Does this effect specific model years of Subaru or all Subaru vehicles with STARLINK enabled?
Says the Hacker News post
For a better answer, it affects the Ascent, Crosstrek, Forester, Impreza, Legacy, Outback, and WRX per the NHTSA TSB. Worth noting that the TSB only goes back to the 2017 model year, but manufacturers love to minimize the cost of their mistakes and won't always include the full generation of a vehicle (in this case back to 2015 for the Outback) despite it being an issue for them.
In short: If your Subaru is pre-2020 and has Starlink, then it's likely affected.
Well this explains a lot...
Don't even have to do that, can just pull the fuse, but the issue with those solutions s is Subaru ran the power to the bluetooth microphone and front speakers through the DCM so removing it or the fuse causes those to stop working as well. Fixing that requires opening the stereo head unit for rewiring internally, well past the skills or comfort levels of most owners.
I get why they did it, but it still could have been done a better way at the price of a few cents of wiring.
They ran it that way because the DCM has it's own backup battery, this is necessary so the system works in the event of a crash and power from the main battery is cut as you'd want the microphone to work to talk to the service and the speakers to work so the driver can hear the service.
Crash happens, main battery power is cut, system activates to call emergency services, backup battery for DCM can power it, the speakers, and the microphone. Assuming the backup battery still works, oh wait... there's a TSB for that too because they're aging out even if the DCM is replaced with one that can connect to LTE.