Blog Archives - Page 14 of 20

21 April, 2021 . 6 mins read

When Last Mile Delivery Turns Autonomous – What are the Considerations?

As more of our lives becomes connected to networks and online services, we are finding that previously labor-intensive tasks like getting groceries or using public transportation are becoming streamlined as reservations and payments can be made online, even bringing items to your front door. But with increased connectivity comes greater expectations for faster, efficient, affordable, and secure services and deliveries.

The delivery process may seem straightforward – order your product, the seller arranges products for delivery, and the delivery service brings it to you – the actual process of getting the many different products with different supply chains together in one place, then arrange the transport going from the hub to the final destination. This portion of the trip is called “last-mile delivery” as it’s one of the trickiest parts of the supply chain process. Not only is last mile delivery the part that we as consumers often care the most about, last mile delivery accounts for around 53% of the total cost of shipping and sellers are taking less of a cut as supply chains struggle to meet demand and deadlines.

(Source: EFT)

Last mile deliveries are often inefficient because of the sheer volume of deliveries necessary with a low drop size. This means that efficiency is virtually impossible with retail sales only going up, especially with a global pandemic.

Taking care of the last-mile challenge

The supply chain management industry experts have been looking for solutions to this dilemma. Many have pointed to models that utilize digital platforms to crowdsource local services to ensure that consumers are able to get what they need. Instead of manually dispatching delivery people to make the trip, platforms will utilize machine learning and AI to quicken this process.

Another solution that many companies are already cashing in on is the concept of autonomous delivery technology, with the market expected to reach 84.72 billion USD by 2030. In order to make last-mile deliveries more efficient and truly door-to-door, development has been focused on autonomous pods, which can navigate more difficult and uneven terrain to ensure completion of delivery.

Smaller pods focus on small, dynamic designs to ensure efficiency in last-mile delivery. This allows for reduced costs in the delivery pod itself, as well as increased security as the vehicles do not actually carry human beings, allowing for more focus on the actual delivery and of the safety of those around them. Especially with the global pandemic, solutions like autonomous delivery allow for contactless service, without driving up costs. Analysts at McKinsey found that semiautonomous and autonomous technology reduce delivery costs on average by approximately 10 to 40 percent.

Autonomous delivery challenges

We can already see this crowdsourcing model mentioned in the previous section in the real world, prevalent in industries like transportation (think ride-hailing apps), food delivery, and retail apps. But this solution isn’t without challenges of its own, as local services still have a high maintenance cost, and with actual human drivers, there’s likely going to be a larger margin of error and limitations.

This is why tech industry experts say that long-term, autonomous driving technology is the answer. Autonomous vehicle technology has made great headway in the last decade – from the testbeds to public roadways — and while use cases are moving from theoretical plans to reality, there’s still a lot of doubt and logistical issues when it comes to application.

Technology and infrastructure limitations

While there are some companies who have gotten the autonomous delivery robot/pod concept to real-world application, there’s still a lot at risk in terms of how the technology works. Passenger vehicles have yet to be at a Level 4 of autonomous driving (according to the SAE regulations), so it’s not completely realistic to expect autonomous pods to be at this level. We need to be careful to ensure that the priority is placed in keeping human beings (pedestrians and vehicle passengers) safe when pods are navigating through streets.

While the technology is being developed, we also must remember that technology can’t be the only thing to change. Cities also need to ensure that current infrastructure supports the autonomous delivery movement, for example, making sure that roads are paved properly and that any obstacles like potholes or cracks are quickly repaired.

Lack of universal standards and liability regulations

To deal with the infrastructure challenges mentioned in the earlier section, there needs to be universal regulations that allow for both services and end users to use services more effortlessly across state or even country-lines.

In countries like the United States where there are differing federal and state regulations, using mobility services like last-mile deliveries with autonomous technologies can be a challenge. For example, in the state of Pennsylvania, autonomous delivery bots are allowed to maneuver their way through sidewalks as well as roadways. They are technically considered “pedestrians” meaning that the bots can move at a maximum speed of 12 miles per hour in a pedestrian area with a load limit of 550 pounds. This isn’t true for all states as some have no regulations regarding delivery systems like this, while others require permits to be issued by the state.

These technicalities can make a major difference when it comes to not only service operations, but also liability frameworks in the case of an accident. As autonomous technology has not yet been perfected, there is risk when it comes to operation no matter how safe the company deems it. A universal standard or regulation will allow for the risk to be minimized, as much as possible.

Risks of security breach

Because of the groundbreaking nature of this technology, many often focus on the issues surrounding the technology itself. However, we must remember that this technology is connected in nature, meaning that thousands of messages containing data are being exchanged each second in each vehicle. With data like PII, vehicle data, as well as access points to connected devices, a successful breach can be a goldmine for malicious actors.

While autonomous delivery vehicles like pods or robots do not carry any passengers, the personal data that they carry, their operations on pedestrian sidewalks, as well as the close nature of door-to-door delivery still carries implications that we must consider before application.

Short and long-term solutions for autonomous delivery

The technology for autonomous delivery bots will continue to progress. But how quickly this happens depends on other factors. In the long run, standards and regulations will have to be made by legislators and committees, which will influence new infrastructure that will enable this kind of technology to have more widespread adoption.

In the short-term, however, both manufacturers of these pods as well as service providers can prioritize security like authentication and encryption, ensuring that the data stays private. Security solutions can be built into the chipsets in the manufacturing stage, protecting data privacy before vehicles, and pods, hit the road. Solutions like these can ensure that vehicles of all sizes protect not just the items carried inside, but also those around them.

12 April, 2021 . 6 mins read

What is the Security Credential Management System?

We all know that vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communication constitutes the core of autonomous driving. By enabling vehicles and infrastructure to share live information, a safe and seamless autonomous mobility experience can be accomplished. But how exactly does the information sharing process work?

Just like how we communicate with each other via text messages, vehicles communicate with nearby entities by transmitting basic safety messages (BSM) between one another. However, different from us sending text messages, vehicles can send, receive, and process thousands of messages per minute. Every BSM a vehicle sends out contains the current time, along with the vehicle’s speed, location, direction, path, and other safety-related information. The vehicle that receives the BSM will use such information to determine whether it should change its speed and direction, or simply just send an alert to the driver. Despite seeming like a lot of work, this process is totally seamless, where hundreds of BSMs are sent, received, processed, and acted upon within each second.

Sounds easy? While the concept of V2X communication may seem very straightforward, we must figure out how to keep these communications perfectly accurate and effective. A failed, inaccurate, or miscommunicated text message is not usually a great deal. But a failed BSM is a matter of life and death. In fact, it would be fair to say that only 10% of the V2X communication technology is about communication itself, while the rest 90% is about ensuring that these communications are flawless and secure.

The Role of the Security Credential Management System (SCMS)

The Security Credential Management System (SCMS) is a proof-of-concept (POC) security solution for V2X communication. Despite the fancy name, it is essentially a public key infrastructure (PKI) designed to secure V2X messages – in this case – the BSMs. The POC has been officially adopted as a protocol by the United States Department of Transportation (USDOT) and became an industry standard for all providers of PKI-based V2X security solutions, including AUTOCRYPT.

Just like typical PKIs, the main purpose of the SCMS is to ensure trusted communication by securing the message. This involves a three-step process: certificate issuance, encryption, and certificate-based authentication. In simple terms, the SCMS needs to first ensure that the message sender is a legally registered entity, then encrypt the drafted message, after which from the receiver’s side, it needs to ensure that the message is truly the original message and that it has not been altered during transmission. Nevertheless, there are still two major differences between the SCMS and traditional PKIs.

The first difference is capacity. A single SCMS can issue up to 300 billion certificates per year, enough to support up to 300 million vehicles. On the other hand, the largest PKI to date is the Europay-Mastercard-Visa Consortium (EMVCo), which is only capable of issuing less than 10 billion certificates per year.

The second difference is that the SCMS faces a much more demanding situation. PKIs used for financial transactions have one sole purpose of ensuring security. Yet, the SCMS must excel in both security and efficiency, two attributes that are usually viewed as tradeoffs.

How Does the SCMS Work?

When a connected vehicle wants to join the V2X network, it must first send its registration request to the SCMS. After approving the request, the SCMS issues an enrolment certificate to the vehicle. The enrolment certificate acts as the ID for the vehicle, proving itself as an authorized participant.

Now that the vehicle is enrolled to send and receive messages. The SCMS still faces the task of securing the message. In this process, it needs to issue and manage several authorization certificates. Before sending out a message, the on-board unit (OBU) must receive an identification certificate. This certificate acts as a digital signature that gets attached to the message. To protect the privacy of the driver, the identification certificate is encrypted and turned into a pseudonym certificate that does not reveal the identity of the vehicle owner.

Before the receiver opens the message, the SCMS compares the sender’s digital signature with a list of previously revoked signatures to ensure that the signature is currently valid. After passing all verifications, the message is given to the receiver to process.

Other entities like roadside infrastructure also undergo the same process before sending a message. Roadside units (RSU) receive application certificates that are equivalent to the identification certificates of OBUs. However, in this case, there is no need to transform them into pseudonym certificates.

security credential management system chart

Why is the SCMS Useful for V2X Security?

Ensuring data integrity. In the V2X communication process, it is crucial to ensure that the message transmitted is not altered by any third party. Since the SCMS seals the messages with digital signatures, then verifies the signature upon receival. There is no endpoint for malicious actors to manipulate the message.

Ensuring data authenticity. Since an identity certificate is issued every time before a sender sends a message, there is no potential loophole for a threat actor to send fake messages in the identity of someone else.

Ensuring privacy. As mentioned above, the identity certificate issued to an OBU is encrypted into a pseudonym certificate. On top of that, the message itself only contains information on the vehicle’s condition and behaviour but not the vehicle’s identity. This makes it nearly impossible to trace the message back to the sender vehicle’s owner.

Ensuring interoperability. Instead of having V2X security providers developing their own set of mechanisms, the SCMS acts as a protocol that ensures all the developed solutions are interoperable with one another. This is a key benefit because interoperability is crucial to V2X communication.

Revocation. Different from traditional PKIs, the SCMS keeps a record of all revoked devices that had been reported with misbehaving, malfunctioning, or even malicious actions. The record helps prevent the same threats from reoccurring, significantly lowering the risks associated with the system.

AutoCrypt V2X, Securing Autonomous Driving with Decades of Experience in PKI

The SCMS protocol is complemented by a few other industry standards to ensure the deployment of secure and efficient PKIs for the V2X network. As such, AutoCrypt PKI is not only designed based on the SCMS, but also is in line with the Crash Avoidance Metrics Partners (CAMP) and the Cooperative ITS Credential Management System (CCMS). Combining AutoCrypt PKI with the software development kit installed locally into the OBUs, along with AutoCrypt LCM, the local certificate manager in charge of message encryption, AutoCrypt V2X is the most complete solution for autonomous driving.

To keep informed with the latest news on mobility tech and automotive cybersecurity, subscribe to AUTOCRYPT’s monthly newsletter.

26 March, 2021 . 8 mins read

Top 7 Smart Cities and Their ITS Achievements

The Challenge of Megacities

As the fourth industrial revolution continues to transform the global economy, people around the world are flocking to cities in the seemingly never-ending urbanization trend. Apart from global cities like New York and London, nearly every regional population center around the world is experiencing population growth, forcing these cities to expand into nearby suburbs by building new roads and infrastructure.

Consequently, the problem with expanding outwards is that these cities become so large, forcing their residents to travel long distances on a daily basis – not just for work, but also for social gatherings, shopping, and recreational activities. This puts significant strain on roads and highways, leading to constant traffic jams and frequent accidents.

Many suggest public transportation as a solution. Indeed, well-operated subway and buses may be convenient for inner-city travel, but for a megacity with a dozen satellite cities surrounding the core, building public transportation becomes expensive, and usually takes decades of construction. Moreover, let us be honest, a 20-station subway ride might not necessarily be a better alternative to being stuck in traffic.

Hence, we should not blindly blame the municipal governments for not building more subway lines, expecting public transportation to solve all problems. Even though public transportation is great for short to medium distance travel, but for long-distance trips, we must address the problem at its roots: to improve roads and infrastructure.

Smart City and the Intelligent Transportation System (ITS)

Improving roads does not simply mean adding additional lanes, because wide roads and highways can lead to excessive lane hopping and cause even more delays. Thus, instead of making wider roads, a better alternative would be to make smarter roads.

Building smarter roads has become a crucial project for smart cities. That is, to build roads and transportation infrastructure that collect data generated from daily traffic, then analyze and learn these data to improve the usability, effectiveness, and accessibility of the roads and infrastructure. These smart roads and infrastructure are collectively called the intelligent transportation system (ITS).

In this article, we will look at a list of smart cities in the world and their special contributions and achievements in advancing the ITS.

Hong Kong

Hong Kong has long been a global financial center and transportation hub that sits at the center of the Asia-Pacific region. Despite having more than 7 million residents, the city had very limited land for suburban expansion due to its administrative and physical geography. This forced the city to build a sophisticated network of roads and highways, with roughly 800,000 registered vehicles sharing over 2,000 km of road – nearly 400 vehicles for every kilometer. Due to such pressure, Hong Kong became one of the first cities in the world to adopt an Area Traffic Control (ATC) system. The system uses CCTVs installed at signalized intersections to provide real-time information on traffic flow. The traffic controllers then analyze such information to gain insights on where accidents frequently occur and adjust traffic signal lengths optimized for both motorists and pedestrians.

Sydney

Like Hong Kong’s ATC system, the capital of the Australian state of New South Wales has gone a step further by developing an Adaptive Traffic Signal Control (ATSC) system that is capable of adapting to the real-time situation. Patented and owned by New South Wales, the system is hence named the Sydney Coordinate Adaptive Traffic System (SCATS). SCATS adjusts the timings of green and red signals based on the real-time traffic flow of each direction. Hence instead of having fixed time durations for each signal, an optimized duration is calculated in real-time using the data collected by CCTVs as well as sensors built into the ground. Apart from New South Wales, SCATS is currently installed in almost all signalized traffic intersections in Australia, as well as over 55,000 intersections across 187 cities and 28 countries worldwide.

Singapore

As a city-state, Singapore’s issue is very similar to that of Hong Kong. With over 5.7 million residents living in a land area of only two-thirds of that of Hong Kong, the city’s government had no choice but to discourage personal vehicle ownership by enforcing a 100% import tariff and additional registration fees that bring the cost up to three to four times the market value. Nevertheless, Singapore has also adopted a sophisticated ITS in more recent years. To manage the ITS, the city introduced i-Transport, an integrated platform that stores and manages raw data collected from the traffic sensors. Its major role is to analyze these data into useful information to help road development and planning. The i-Transport platform has enabled a variety of useful services, including the Parking Guidance System (PGS). The PGS collects real-time information on leftover parking spots in nearby parking lots and displays this information on large digital information panels on the roadside so that drivers can easily find the nearest parking lot without having to circle around downtown streets looking for available parking space. As Singapore’s ITS continues to make its roads smarter, hopefully, the government will be able to slowly relieve the astronomical costs of purchasing cars.

Las Vegas

Cities in North America face a very different problem than that of Hong Kong and Singapore. Since most cities have plenty of space surrounding them for urban expansion, a North American “city” is usually a large metropolitan area that interconnects dozens of cities and towns. To put it in perspective, despite San Francisco proper being home to only 900,000 residents, nearly 5 million people live in its metropolitan area. Since these cities are bigger, their local streets tend to be less crowded. However, the highways that go through them face constant congestion, especially when a highway acts as both the inner-city highway and the interstate highway, like the Ontario 401 – the busiest highway on the continent. The biggest problem for American highways is that they have too many lanes. Las Vegas has an interesting solution to organize traffic on these highways. Its Active Traffic Management (ATM) system consists of large, high-resolution digital panels on top of the highways. The system uses cameras and sensors to collect big data and analyze them so that they can accurately estimate traffic conditions and travel times for each individual lane. It then displays the average speed ahead for each individual lane, as well as putting an “X” above lanes that are closed ahead due to traffic accidents or constructions. The ATM system helps drivers make informed decisions on which lanes to use and when to switch lanes without having to blindly change lanes back and forth.

New York

With over 20 million residents in its metropolitan area, New York City is by far the most populous urban center of the United States. This has pushed the Big Apple to develop an ITS that focuses on smoothing traffic. Recently, New York City signed a contract with Transition Networks, an IoT manufacturer, to add internet connections to the cameras and sensors of over 10,000 signalized traffic intersections across the city. These connected devices allow for centralized management and remote maintenance, reducing the need for any physical workers to be present on site.

Barcelona

Barcelona has been a leader of smart city transformation in Europe. Over the past decade, all the streetlights in Barcelona have been replaced by an LED-based lighting system. The system can automatically adjust its brightness and angle based on environmental information like temperature, humidity, pollution, and visibility. It is also capable of detecting noise so that the lamps can switch on and off depending on the existence of pedestrians. Not only does this new lighting system save energy, but it also reduces the heat generated by conventional lamps.

Jeju

This island city of South Korea is one of the world’s pioneers in developing a Cooperative Intelligent Transport System (C-ITS). Different from ITS, which uses collected data to provide useful information, a C-ITS involves real-time exchange of information between roads, infrastructure, and the vehicles themselves, making it a crucial part of the autonomous driving experience. The city has also introduced a number of C-ITS devices that can be installed into cars, providing drivers with real-time information on the roads ahead, warning drivers on emergency vehicles passing by, road closure, and even slippery road conditions (based on data collected from other vehicles). To learn more about C-ITS, read: 7 Major Functions of Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems.

AutoCrypt V2X, Securing Data for C-ITS

As advancements in automotive technology bring us connected cars and autonomous driving. smart cities are taking a step further to develop C-ITS with the goal of establishing a safe and seamless experience of connectivity on the road. Yet, autonomous driving has also brought us a new challenge; since data involved in C-ITS directly impact vehicle behaviour, they must be safely guarded against manipulation and theft.

This is one of the main reasons AUTOCRYPT was founded. As a built-in software development kit, AutoCrypt V2X uses sophisticated encryption and authentication technologies to ensure that all V2X-enabled units are verified and all data in transmission are safely protected.

To keep informed with the latest news on mobility tech and automotive cybersecurity, subscribe to AUTOCRYPT’s monthly newsletter.

2 March, 2021 . 8 mins read

Reusing and Recycling Electric Vehicle Batteries: A Bright Future

Are Electric Vehicles Environmentally Sustainable?

Have you ever heard of anyone talking about how smartphones are environmentally friendly because they do not generate emissions? Probably not. Instead, you would more likely hear criticisms on the build-up of electronic wastes. Then why do we think electric vehicles (EVs) are green?

EVs are only green because they are relatively greener when compared to conventional gasoline-powered vehicles. Yet, when speaking absolute terms, there is still plenty of room for improvement because environmental friendliness does not equal to environmental sustainability. Even though EVs do not generate emissions during usage, pollution could still potentially occur during two other stages: the power generation stage and the battery disposal stage. Whether EVs are truly environmentally sustainable heavily depends on these two factors.

Pollution at the power generation stage has long been a widely discussed topic for decades. Yet, this is not something to criticize the EV for because it is not a problem within the EV itself. Moreover, there is a clear solution for it; we all know countries around the world are working hard towards increasing their share of renewable energy consumption. Thereby, pollution at the power generation stage will gradually decrease in the long run, eventually reaching environmental sustainability.

On the other hand, most skepticism and resistance of the EV stem from the potential pollution at the battery disposal stage. This is because it is a new problem created by the EV itself. Even though in fact we are eliminating a larger problem by creating a smaller problem, our minds are wired in a way in which losses loom larger than gains, as Kahneman and Tversky’s Prospect Theory suggests. Therefore, to completely persuade all people to adopt EVs, we must eliminate this potential electric vehicle batteries’ disposal problem first.

What Does an EV Battery Look Like?

Two types of batteries are commonly found in EVs. First, there is the lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery, which is by far the most used battery in EVs today thanks to their low manufacturing cost and ability to retain power. The second type is the nickel-metal hydride battery, which has the advantage of a longer lifecycle. However, they are almost solely used in hybrid vehicles because of their high self-discharge rate – a problem critical to battery electric vehicles (BEV) but not so much for hybrids. (In a previous infographic, we broke down four types of EVs and discussed their pros and cons. For a recap on that, refer to: The Different Types of Electric Vehicles.)

Lithium-ion batteries are the same type of battery used in consumer electronics like smartphones. While a smartphone battery contains a single cell, a EV battery pack consists of thousands of such cells. Due to such scale, EV batteries last at least eight to ten years, or 160,000 kilometers before their performance start to drop. This is a significantly longer lifecycle than smartphone batteries, which only last two to three years. However, the scale of the battery packs also creates a challenge in disposal.

How Can Electric Vehicle Batteries be Treated at Their End of Life?

The global production capacity for lithium-ion batteries today is ten times that of ten years ago, partially due to the increased demand for smartphones, but largely due to the demand forecast for EVs. At the same time, the first generation of BEVs and hybrids are now reaching their end of life, meaning that we are now facing the beginning of a massive wave of retired batteries waiting to be treated. As the ticking time bomb starts to run out of time, a lot of controversies started arising on whether EVs are truly an environmentally sustainable means of transportation.

This is indeed a problem, but not an unsolvable problem. Environmental engineers have been working on a wide range of possible solutions to treat retired batteries. It is only a matter of time before the industry adopts these solutions.

Most energy experts suggest a two-step solution, that is to reuse the batteries to their fullest, and recycle as many of the components as possible. Let us take a deeper look at how these can be done.

First, Reuse

A battery is only completely dead when it can no longer be reused to power anything. For instance, after a set of alkaline batteries get retired from powering an RC car, they can still be used to power TV remote controls for another six months. The same idea goes for electric vehicle batteries. Engineers suggest using retired EV batteries for less demanding purposes, such as storing energy to power houses and buildings. This is especially considering that EVs have very high requirements for batteries, such that a 20% drop in battery capacity would end up needing replacement. Hence, after a battery pack becomes no longer fit to power a car, it would most likely be still perfectly fine for less demanding tasks. It is estimated that a retired EV battery pack has enough collect-discharge capacity to power a solar-powered house for another seven to ten years.

Many automotive manufacturers are quickly stepping into the game to capture this blue-ocean market. Toyota has signed a contract with 7-Eleven in Japan to install retired electric vehicle batteries from their cars in 7-Eleven convenience stores. These batteries would be used to store energy collected from solar panels and use them to power the appliances in the stores. GM, BMW, and BYD are also looking for ways to reuse their batteries to power homes, stores, and car charging stations.

Then, Recycle

Of course, after reusage, batteries will eventually reach a point where they are no longer functional for any task. This is when they finally need to be recycled.

The recycling process for lithium-ion batteries is called hydrometallurgy. The most common method of hydrometallurgy used today is called leaching, which requires the use of strong acid to dissolve the battery into a liquid metallic solution, then separate the solution to recover the raw materials. This process is not easy because it requires the recycler to first remove the plastic coating on the batteries and completely drain the power out of them first. Since lithium-ion batteries do not have standardized sizes, it is very expensive for third-party recyclers to perform all these tasks. As a result, only 10% of lithium-ion batteries today – mostly coming from electronic devices – are recycled. Even among those 10% recycled, only about half of the components are recovered as raw materials, with the other half being dumped.

Do not be discouraged by such a low figure, because it is not a result of technical challenges, but instead due to a lack of readiness. Hence, as the industry starts to take appropriate measures to adapt to these changes, the future is very promising. With standardized battery sizes, standardized packaging, and dedicated recycling facilities, the recycling cost can be remarkably reduced. Moreover, if automakers start to recycle their own batteries, it is totally possible to reach a recycling rate above 90%.

To put it in perspective, the recycling rate of lead-acid batteries found in gasoline-powered vehicles is 99.2%, in which 99% of the lead is recycled. Alkaline batteries also have a recycling rate above 90% thanks to their standardized sizes and components. Therefore, it is only a matter of time until EV batteries match these figures.

Many news startups have been created to compete in this aftermarket. Automotive manufacturers around the world are also starting to take the responsibility of battery recycling. For example, Volkswagen Group Components, a subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group, has been created to fully dedicate its work into battery recycling, with its goal of returning 97% of the components inside a battery back into the manufacturing process. The Chinese government even went a step further by making a law that requires car manufacturers to take full responsibility in recycling their batteries.

In the end, as the demand for batteries continues to rise, the recycling industry is expected to catch on quickly within the next few years. Energy researchers are expecting that by 2025, about 75% of all electric vehicle batteries will be reused for different purposes, then broken down and recycled to use as raw materials again in the manufacturing process.

A Bright Future for the EV Industry

Even though EVs might not be completely environmentally sustainable yet, the long-term prospect is promising. As the battery reuse and recycling industry catches up, EVs will soon become a critical part of the renewable energy supply chain. To learn more about the EV’s role in the power grid, read: How Plug&Charge Might Make EV Charging a Lifesaver.

To keep informed with the latest news on mobility tech and automotive cybersecurity, subscribe to AUTOCRYPT’s monthly newsletter.

22 February, 2021 . 5 mins read

Top 6 Benefits of a Fleet Management System

What is Fleet Management?

Purchasing a car is easy, but owning one requires a lot of effort. What are some of the basic responsibilities that comes with owning a car? First there are the legal obligations, the owner must pay for license plate registration and renewal, purchase and renew car insurance on an annual basis, and pay for respective taxes. When it comes to usage, the owner needs to first have a place to store the car, bring the car to the service center for periodic inspections and maintenance, change tires and install winter tires as needed, wash the car occasionally, and lastly, fill up the car with fuel or electricity on a weekly, if not daily basis. Now imagine being the owner of a fleet of commercial vehicles. The work required to maintain these vehicles become extremely complex because the responsibilities are likely split between multiple individuals, adding to the complication that the primary driver of each vehicle tend to change over time. This makes a fleet management system necessary for all commercial fleet operators.

As the name suggests, fleet management is the practice of managing a fleet of commercial vehicles, such as cars, trucks, ships, and even delivery robots. It is commonly used by mobility providers such as public transportation companies, carsharing service providers, and delivery firms to ensure that their vehicles are used safely, efficiently, and well-maintained.

In this article, we will introduce six major benefits of using a fleet management system.

What Are the Benefits of a Fleet Management System?

1. Managing Administrative Work

A fleet management system keeps a record of all data regarding the vehicles. This includes every vehicle’s purchasing, financing, and leasing information, registration information, and insurance information. Since oftentimes the vehicles are purchased under different terms and conditions, it can be extremely difficult to keep track of these data and follow these conditions. This often leads to fines, penalties, and expenses that could have been totally avoidable. Using a fleet management system helps the owner manage these administrative works easily without missing any deadlines.

2. Managing Vehicle Maintenance

The biggest challenge of owning and operating a fleet is keeping all the vehicles properly maintained. Since vehicles are one of the most valuable assets for mobility providers, periodic inspections and maintenance help prolong their service life and significantly reduce costs in the long run. A fleet management system allows the fleet manager to track the current condition and maintenance history of every vehicle. Oftentimes, customized notifications can be selected so that the fleet manager can receive warnings on any vehicle issues in real-time. Without a fleet management system, it becomes very challenging and costly to detect and fix problems immediately and keeping vehicles maintained on schedule.

3. Managing Fuel Consumption

Apart from labour and maintenance costs, fuel expense is a major operating expense for mobility providers. Saving a few dollars per day on a vehicle does not seem like a lot, but the aggregate savings of a fleet of vehicles on an annual basis can make a remarkable difference on the financial standings of a company. A fleet management system can help maximize fuel economy by enabling the fleet manager to not only track each vehicle’s real-time mileage and fuel expenses, but also to analyze each driver’s behaviour to identify any wasteful usage patterns, such as excessive acceleration and prolonged idling.

4. Managing EV Range and Charging

For mobility providers that use autonomous and electric vehicles as part of their fleet, tracking their range and having them charged on time becomes a crucial task, because the last thing you want is to have the car run out of power before reaching the passenger’s destination. A fleet management system can make this process seamless and automated, so that vehicles can be dispatched and allocated appropriately.

5. Managing Driver Performance and Safety

It is very hard for mobility providers to establish consistent service quality because it almost entirely depends on the individual driver. A fleet management system can keep track of every vehicle’s activity in real-time, which is a clear reflection of the driver’s driving habit and behaviour. A fleet manager can use the system to set up customized reporting on all kinds of inappropriate behaviours – for instance – driving over 20km/h above the speed limit, sudden acceleration and braking, and prolonged idling during operation hours. This is especially useful for taxi companies, as the drivers could exhibit reckless driving behaviours to beat the clock and compete for business. Hence, using a fleet management system not only helps improve service quality, but also greatly reduces the possibility of road accidents.

6. Service Optimization

The road is a dynamic place. Many external factors can affect the service of a mobility provider, including traffic jams, weather conditions, accidents, constructions, and road closure. A fleet management system can help the mobility provider gain real-time insights on where their vehicles and potential customers are. The fleet manager can then dispatch and direct vehicles to areas where demands are high. The system also improves route planning to minimize travel time. To make this process more automated, an end-user interface is oftentimes accompanied by a fleet management system so that the customers can reserve for services directly on their smartphones.

AutoCrypt FMS, Fleet Management Utilizing Smart Mobility Infrastructure

AutoCrypt FMS is a fleet management system that offers customized services for mobility providers to monitor and manage all their resources in a secured and reliable way. By establishing secured communication with encryption and authentication technologies, AutoCrypt FMS ensures the accuracy and privacy of all data collected and stored in the process. By utilizing big data from other V2X-enabled entities, it offers some of the most advanced benefits of a fleet management system, along with highly comprehensive and secure insights. Click here to learn more about AutoCrypt FMS.

To keep informed with the latest news on mobility tech and automotive cybersecurity, subscribe to AUTOCRYPT’s monthly newsletter.

5 February, 2021 . 6 mins read

7 Major Functions of Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems

Autonomous Driving: The Bigger Picture

What comes to mind first when you think of autonomous driving? Most likely we would think about self-driving cars with adaptive cruising technology like Tesla Autopilot. Indeed, adaptive cruising supported by sensors and cameras is a core component of autonomous driving. Yet this is only a small part of the bigger picture. In fact, no matter how advanced and sophisticated adaptive cruising technology becomes, there will always be room for error to occur in situations like extreme weather events and unexpected road conditions.

Therefore, the vehicle alone is not sufficient to ensure a perfectly safe and seamless autonomous driving experience. To complete the full picture, cooperative intelligent transport systems (C-ITS) is needed to ensure that every vehicle on the road knows exactly what they need to know at the right time and the right place.

Intelligent Transportation Systems

Before looking at C-ITS, let us first look at what intelligent transport systems (ITS) are. These are the systems that collect and analyze data to improve the driving experience as well as to regulate traffic. Examples of ITS include the modern GPS navigation system which provides drivers with real-time information on traffic levels, estimated travel times, traffic accidents, road constructions, and even locations of traffic enforcement cameras. Another interesting ITS is the left-turn lane sensor, which are sensors embedded on the grounds of the left-turn lane at intersections, so that the left-turn signal would only turn on when needed.

C-ITS are simply more advanced ITS where vehicles and other road entities share their data to “cooperate” with each other on the road. Such cooperation is made possible by V2X (vehicle-to-everything) technology, which allows vehicles to communicate directly with infrastructures (V2I), pedestrians (V2P), and the greater network (V2N).

In a previous blog article, we have discussed in detail on what V2X technology is and how it is applied. To read that article, see: DSRC vs. C-V2X: A Detailed Comparison of the 2 Types of V2X Technologies. Today, we are here to look at seven of the major functionalities and benefits of C-ITS and how they paint the full picture of autonomous driving.

1. Collecting driving data

All kinds of driving data – including location, speed, time, and vehicle condition – are collected from the vehicles’ on-board units. These data (when given consent by the owners) will be stored a data center accessible by transportation regulators and infrastructure developers to help enhance transportation infrastructure and road safety. Sometimes, automakers (OEMs) also collect data of their cars to further improve their models with software updates and hardware improvements.

2. Exchanging real-time information on traffic

As vehicles share their location and speed with each other, a massive transportation network consisting of real-time data is formed. Every vehicle can then utilize the collective information on the current traffic flows and even analyze them to predict future traffic conditions in the next few hours. This allows all vehicles to choose an optimized route for their destination, significantly reducing traffic jams while saving time and money spent in traffic.

3. Exchanging real-time information on road hazards

Traffic data are not enough to guarantee road safety. With C-ITS, vehicles receive data on a wide range of information on road conditions, including road surface temperature, humidity, and buildup of snow and rain from precipitations. Vehicles are also warned of curvy and slopy roads, road breakage, as well as areas where traffic accidents frequently occur. Lastly, information on emergency road maintenance and road construction gets shared with vehicles to make sure that they are well-informed of road hazards and respond safely by reducing speed or detouring.

4. Exchanging real-time information on vehicle hazards

The smart traffic network also collects live information on dangerous vehicles such as trucks and buses, as well as those traveling at abnormally fast or slow speeds. Surrounding vehicles then get notified to stay aware of such hazards. In case accidents occur, vehicles behind will be directed to reduce their speed to prevent secondary accidents, because most traffic-related deaths involve secondary accidents. The locations of emergency vehicles are also shared so that other vehicles on the road can clear out a line ahead of time, allowing them to pass by quickly.

5. Directing traffic at intersections

Even though traffic lights are designed to protect the safety of cars and pedestrians at intersections, there are still conflicting situations where safety fully depends on the driver’s judgment. Take the left turn for example, drivers need to simultaneously pay attention to three different things: 1) the signal ahead, 2) cars traveling down from the opposite direction, and 3) pedestrians on the left-side crosswalk. One misjudgment can lead to danger. With C-ITS, this conflict resolution process gets sorted out automatically, significantly improving safety at intersections.

6. Toll collection

Roadside infrastructure tracks the identities of vehicles entering toll roads. The respective toll fees then get deducted automatically from the financial accounts pre-registered to each vehicle, making the payment process seamless. Since there is no longer the need to slow down at toll stations, highway traffic jams can be partially relieved.

7. Pedestrian protection

The ultimate goal of autonomous driving is to guarantee the safety of both drivers and pedestrians. With C-ITS, vehicles are directed to slow down in both school zones and silver zones. With V2P technology, cars receive data from the pedestrians’ mobile devices so that even when the pedestrian is hidden in sight, the car can still prepare to stop ahead of time. This is especially useful at intersections where pedestrian-related accidents are most common.

The Importance of Data Security for C-ITS

Cooperative intelligent transport systems are supported by all kinds of data from drivers, vehicles, and infrastructures. Even though these data might not necessarily contain personally identifiable information (PII), information on a city’s transportation infrastructure can still be exploited by malicious actors to commit various crimes. Furthermore, the messages in transmission also needs to be protected to prevent manipulations, which could lead to severe physical damages.

AutoCrypt V2X is a software-based security solution that is built into the chipsets embedded in both on-board units and roadside units, helping protect data privacy while ensuring the accuracy of the shared messages. As a major mobility security supplier for OEMs, chipmakers, and infrastructure developers, AUTOCRYPT has been collaborating with the government in a number of C-ITS projects.

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