MUNICH, GERMANY, April 25, 2022 — AUTOCRYPT, a leading V2X communications cybersecurity company, was the only Asian PKI provider to participate in the 3rd C-V2X Plugtests ™ interoperability testing event organized by ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Insititute) in partnership with 5GAA at the DEKRA technology center for automobiles located in Klettwitz, Germany. The event enabled different vendors, specializing in on-board units, roadside units, and public key infrastructure, to run test sessions and assess the level of interoperability based on the latest C-ITS communications and security standards, all under the watchful eye of highway operators, automobile manufacturers, and government bodies.
AutoCrypt V2X-PKI, a core component of the C-ITS security suite that is compliant with the standards of the US SCMS, European-based SCMS, and Chinese-based SCMS, has successfully demonstrated interoperability through various state-of-the-art safety use cases, including road hazard signaling, road works warning, time to green, in-vehicle signage, traffic jam warning, longitudinal collision risk warning, and intersection collision risk warning.
All the tests run by AUTOCRYPT were based on ETSI’s TS sector standards, including V2X communication security and SCMS for C-ITS. The tests showed that AUTOCRYPT’s solutions accomplished high levels of interoperability with other companies that are actively engaging in the development of C-V2X for the automotive industry. Through this inspection and supplementation, AUTOCRYPT expects to develop pilot projects led by the European governments and equipment companies within the year.
Daniel ES Kim, CEO of Autocrypt Technologies GmbH, said: “It was an honor for AUTOCRYPT to be one of the selected companies at the 3rd C-V2X Plugtests ™. As V2X communications usage in the automotive industry continues to increase and PKI plays a central role in its secure development, it is critical that we continue to strengthen our SCMS management capabilities through various interoperability tests across the globe. The successful demonstration of our PKI solutions means that we are continuing to lead the industry and ensure a safer, more reliable environment to support our users.”
AUTOCRYPT will continue to raise the standards in the PKI sector and will be demonstrating its new V2X capabilities at the highly anticipated ITF 2022 Summit this coming May. This year’s International Transport Forum will convene various experts across industries and governments to share insights on enabling social inclusion through utilizing innovative technologies in transport while promoting sustainable economic growth.
As the deployment of applications using PKI continues to increase, AUTOCRYPT looks forward to bringing new fully customizable products and solutions to market for the benefit and safety of the industry, passengers, and the public.
Vulnerable road user (VRU) is a term used to describe any road user who is not inside a motor vehicle. This can mean a pedestrian, a cyclist (or motorcyclist), a scooterist, or someone in a wheelchair. Compared to motorists, VRUs are much more likely to suffer from severe injuries or death in a traffic accident due to their lack of external protection. Although vehicle-pedestrian crashes are much less common than vehicle-vehicle crashes, these accidents still contribute to a significant number of road fatalities. According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), pedestrian fatalities account for 17% of all casualties from traffic accidents, while cyclist fatalities account for another 2%.
Why Are VRU Fatalities Increasing?
During the past decade, we have seen significant improvements in Advanced Driver-Assistance Systems (ADAS), including features like pedestrian detection and warning. This gives us an intuition that VRU safety must have been improving. Shockingly, a completely opposite trend was observed. Pedestrian fatalities have in fact increased by 51% over the past ten years, most of which occurred in urban areas.
Given all the technological advancements, why isn’t the pedestrian fatality rate falling? One possible explanation is the growing popularity of SUVs, which are taller than sedans and more likely to hit the pedestrian’s upper body in crashes. Another likely cause is that both drivers and pedestrians today face constant smartphone distraction, making them less focused and attentive on the road.
The Struggles to Keep VRUs Safe
Over the past few years, urban planners and policymakers have been implementing progressive approaches to improve VRU safety by either eliminating roadways in crowded urban centers or reducing the speed limit to less than 30 km/h in city streets. However, these countermeasures are only effective in cities with a well-established public transit system that can handle a drastic increase in passengers. For many cities that rely heavily on personal vehicles, implementing such measures can be quite disruptive and inefficient for daily commuters.
Protecting VRUs isn’t about sacrificing one group for the other. It is essentially about protecting everyone, as every driver technically becomes a VRU the moment they exit the car. Hence, finding a balanced solution that benefits both motorists and VRUs is crucial. In this regard, V2P technology shows great potential. V2P (vehicle-to-pedestrian) technology is a sub-type of V2X (vehicle-to-everything) communications technology that allows vehicles to communicate with pedestrians in real-time wirelessly. With V2P, vehicles and pedestrians will be able to cooperate seamlessly on the road to prevent accidents.
How Does V2P Differ From V2V and V2I?
V2P operates under the same mechanism as other types of V2X communications like V2V (vehicle-to-vehicle) and V2I (vehicle-to-infrastructure). However, there are some unique aspects of V2P that make its deployment and application somewhat different from the other two.
Installation
To enable any V2X communication, a V2X connectivity unit must be installed on every end entity of the ecosystem. An end entity can be a vehicle, a traffic signal, a roadside camera, and many more. The V2X connectivity units can either be embedded within the end entities during the manufacturing process or externally connected to existing vehicles and infrastructure that do not have embedded units.
However, we cannot simply install V2X connectivity units on unpowered V2P entities like bicycles, scooters, skateboards, wheelchairs, and of course, the human body. In this case, smartphones can act as end entities. A compact and lightweight portable V2X device can be plugged into the mobile devices of VRUs so that they can easily participate in V2P communications. These portable V2X devices are extremely versatile and can be plugged anytime into all kinds of smart devices such as phones, tablets, and vehicle head units via common ports like USB-C.
Another potential deployment method relies on a specific type of V2X mode—the C-V2X Uu interface. Different from the PC5 interface—which enables end entities to communicate directly with each other without going through any medium—the Uu interface sends all messages through the mobile broadband spectrum, connecting all entities to the cellular network. Under this mode, all smart devices with cellular connectivity become readily available V2X connectivity units with no need for external hardware.
Application
Whereas V2V and V2I communications are used to serve the purpose of vehicle-infrastructure cooperated autonomous driving (VICAD), V2P adds VRU cooperation to the mix, taking autonomous driving to the next level. By doing so, it further enhances the safety of autonomous driving in urban areas by complementing conventional ADAS and pedestrian warning systems. In application, vehicles receive the real-time location, speed, and direction of every VRU in their surroundings, allowing them to respond immediately to all kinds of unexpected behaviours.
On the other hand, V2P can also be used to issue warning messages to pedestrians. Many observational studies have pointed out the severity of pedestrian smartphone distraction. One study in Melbourne found that 20% of all walkers were on their smartphones while crossing the road. These “smartphone zombies” are at a significantly higher risk of traffic accidents. With V2P-enabled smartphones, these walkers can be alarmed at traffic signals and pedestrian crossings.
Better Autonomous Driving Starts from Road User Cooperation
Even though most developments in autonomous driving have been focusing on V2V and V2I applications, we should not forget that vehicles are not the only road users. To make autonomous driving smarter and safer, more participants should be invited to join the ecosystem. Adding VRUs to the cooperated autonomous driving mix has the potential to greatly reduce vehicle-VRU accidents and improve road safety and efficiency in urban areas.
AUTOCRYPT is actively working on developing technologies that accelerate V2P deployment. To stay informed and updated on the latest news about AUTOCRYPT and mobility tech, subscribe to AUTOCRYPT’s quarterly newsletter.
To learn more about AUTOCRYPT’s mobility service solutions, contact global@autocrypt.io.
SEOUL, KOREA, February 16, 2022 — Autonomous driving security leader, AUTOCRYPT, announced that its V2X security solution, AutoCrypt V2X, now implements YD/T 3957-2021, the newest standard for LTE-based V2N communications and credential management released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT).
Announced in December 2021 and to be enforced in April 2022, YD/T 3957-2021 utilizes a Trusted Root Certificate List Authority (TRCLA), which manages a Trusted Root Certificate List (TRCL) for the many Root CAs currently authorized in China. AutoCrypt V2X’s Secure Credential Management System has been listed in two Trusted Domain CA Certificate Lists (TDCL) managed by Root CAs listed in the TRCL, meaning clients can more easily operate their connected vehicles and related software in China, without requiring certificate authentication with separate PKIs.
The company’s products already follow the strict C-SCMS standards from China, and regularly update features. CEO and co-Founder Daniel ES Kim remarked: “China has boosted its autonomous driving market in the past few years and will continue to be a major region for development vehicular technology. However, due to its strict C-SCMS standards, many find it difficult to enter the market. Our SCMS ensures full compliance and seamless operations for our OEM and Tier-1 supplier partners who want to utilize V2X communications in China.”
Apart from being the sole V2X provider for all eight C-ITS development projects in South Korea, AUTOCRYPT’s V2X security solution and SCMS has refined its marketability through experience with customers and partners in China, Europe, and North America. Furthermore, its cross-industry interoperability was repeatedly demonstrated at the “Four Layers” C-V2X interoperability demonstration held annually in Shanghai—one of the largest V2X application testing events in the world.
AutoCrypt V2X is the first and only V2X security solution to have successfully completed the demonstration in both areas of device security and the PKI backend. The company is also the first and only provider to have demonstrated interoperability across all three major Security Credential Management System (SCMS) protocols, including the US-based SCMS, European-based C-ITS CMS (CCMS), and China-SCMS (C-SCMS).
V2X (vehicle-to-everything) communication technology enables real-time wireless communication between vehicles (V2V), infrastructure (V2I), and pedestrians (V2P) in the C-ITS (Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems), paving the path towards full driving automation.
Establishing a V2X ecosystem is a massive project that requires a solid foundation, before building blocks are gradually added to serve functional purposes. Thankfully, years of development and testing across multiple industries have laid the foundation that brought the technology to the surface. Many V2X-enabled services are now being applied in smart cities across the globe, marking the beginning of large-scale commercialization.
The below infographic illustrates seven V2X application scenarios that are widely seen today.
Signal Phase and Timing – SpaT is a V2I service used at signalized traffic intersections. The RSU in the traffic signal controller sends a message indicating light color and remaining time to the OBUs of the inbound vehicles. The vehicles then use this information to determine whether to cruise through or decelerate to a stop.
Emergency Vehicle Preemption – EVP is a V2I service that gives road priority to emergency vehicles. The OBU of a dispatched emergency vehicle sends a special message indicating its location and path to the RSUs of upcoming traffic lights. These traffic lights then work in favor of the emergency vehicle to ensure safety and a speedy response.
Intersection Collision Avoidance – IVA is a V2V service that prevents collisions at traffic intersections. The RSU of the roadside camera monitors vehicles and moving objects in all directions and sends a warning message to inbound vehicles when it detects potential signal violators in the cross direction, preventing T-bone collisions.
Emergency Brake Warning – EBW is a V2V service that prevents rear-end collisions caused by sudden braking. The OBU of the braking vehicle sends a message indicating its intended behavior to the OBU of every subsequent vehicle, so that they can all start braking at the same time, preventing collisions and overbraking.
Pedestrian Collision Avoidance – PCA is a V2P service used for pedestrian protection. roadside cameras detect pedestrians on the roadway and send warning messages to nearby vehicles. Newer developments embed RSUs into smartphones so that such warnings can be sent directly from the pedestrian’s devices.
Smart Parking – Smart parking is a V2I service used to match the supply and demand for parking space in real-time. The RSUs of the parking lot sensors send messages notifying parking availability to nearby vehicles, allowing vehicles to drive towards the nearest parking space seamlessly, easing traffic jams in high-density commercial zones.
Do Not Pass Warning – DNPW is a V2V service that is used to ensure safe overtaking on undivided highways. The OBU of the first vehicle in the lane sends messages to the vehicles behind, warning them not to pass when it sees vehicles traveling down from the opposite direction.
To learn more about V2X application scenarios and AUTOCRYPT’s V2X security solutions, see AutoCrypt V2X.
SHANGHAI, CHINA, Oct. 28, 2021 — Leading automotive and mobility cybersecurity provider AUTOCRYPT Co., Ltd. demonstrated the interoperability of its AutoCrypt V2X security solution at the C-V2X Cross-Industry Pilot Plugfest, China’s largest “Four Layers” C-V2X application testing event, held alongside the 2021 China-SAE Congress and Exhibition (SAECCE) in Shanghai from October 19 to 21.
The annual “Four Layers” C-V2X interoperability demonstration is organized by IMT-2020 (5G) Promotion Group C-V2X Working Group and China-SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers), gathering OEMs and Tier 1 suppliers from around the world. This year’s C-V2X demonstration was held on test roads across the Shanghai-Suzhou-Wuxi metropolitan area, one of China’s major ITS hubs.
The “Four Layers” of interoperability refers to the physical layer (vehicle), network layer (on-board units or OBUs), message layer (communication modules), and security layer (V2X modules and key management). In the demonstration, AutoCrypt V2X’s software development kit (SDK) was embedded in the OBUs of a major Tier 1 supplier, while its Security Credential Management System (SCMS) was paired with one of the eight participating root certificate authorities (CA).
“The successful completion of the demonstration continues to confirm the interoperability of AutoCrypt V2X in the C-ITS environment,” said Daniel ES Kim, AUTOCRYPT’s Co-Founder and CEO. “As the V2X security provider for all eight full-scale C-ITS projects in South Korea, AUTOCRYPT has worked closely with OEMs and chipmakers across the globe, and our team is highly experienced in adapting to the specific needs and requirements of each client.”
Along with the demonstration, AUTOCRYPT showcased its latest technologies and offered consultations at SAECCE 2021, where its technical experts made two key presentations, one of which explained the role of Plug&Charge (PnC) security for smart EV charging, while the other provided guidance to OEMs on how to incorporate in-vehicle security systems to meet both WP.29 and Chinese regional regulations.
This marks AUTOCRYPT’s third consecutive year of participation in the dual events. To find out more about AUTOCRYPT’s comprehensive mobility security solutions, contact global@autocrypt.io.
In a previous article DSRC vs. C-V2X: A Detailed Comparison of the 2 Types of V2X Technologies, we explained the differences between DSRC and C-V2X. We mentioned that since these two technologies rely on different wireless communication protocols, there has been no controlled side-by-side comparison on their efficacy. Despite so, based on their real-world usage today, the consensus is that both DSRC and C-V2X are fully capable of direct V2X communication.
However, industry policymakers, infrastructure developers, along with automotive manufacturers, are still racing towards C-V2X deployment even though DSRC is a more mature technology that has already undergone all testing stages. The reason for favoring C-V2X, as we stated last time, is that despite both technologies having similar capabilities today, it is unlikely to remain so in the future. Those in favor of C-V2X argue that the technology provides more room for future improvements and will eventually be much more useful than DSRC.
Hence, in this article, we will explain what exactly the potentials of C-V2X are, starting with the table below:
On the right side of the table, we can see that C-V2X can be broken down into two different modes. The first is direct C-V2X mode. Utilizing the PC5 interface, direct C-V2X is based on unicast communication and operates under the same mechanism as DSRC does. In other words, it enables a vehicle to directly send and receive wireless messages to and from other vehicles and roadside units, given that they are within a certain distance. This kind of unicast communication is what V2X was originally meant for.
All the potentials of C-V2X lie in its second mode, V2N (vehicle-to-network) mode. V2N utilizes a network communications interface called the Uu interface, which essentially enables broadcast communication via existing cellular mobile networks. The ability to connect to the mobile network is a crucial feature that WLAN-based DSRC technology cannot provide. The illustration below shows how direct C-V2X and V2N work together.
Despite all the potentials, V2N technology is not ready for deployment until around 2025. Without V2N, direct C-V2X and DSRC are very comparable in the meantime. Thus, many automakers still choose to implement DSRC in the short run given all the sunk cost invested into the technology.
Nevertheless, key industry players are developing C-V2X to keep themselves prepared for the game-changing potentials of V2N, because broadcast communication will certainly take mobility to the next level.
V2N and Its Potential Benefits
Direct V2X technology – both DSRC and direct C-V2X – is quite capable of ensuring a safe and seamless autonomous driving experience. Then why do we still want to connect vehicles to the mobile network? Skeptics believe that V2N is the result of mobile network operators lobbying policymakers to secure themselves a new revenue source. This is undeniably one of the driven forces for V2N, but there are also many other positive reasons for adopting V2N.
Easy and cheap implementation. Implementing V2N is not difficult. Since V2N operates via cellular mobile networks, a large part of the physical infrastructure is readily available. Most urban areas already have LTE-capable cell towers and are slowly upgrading into 5G infrastructure. If we need the very same technology to provide internet connections for smartphones and IoT, we might as well just use it for vehicles – there is very little reason to not use a technology that is readily available. Additionally, adopting V2N is relatively cheap because both the PC5 and Uu interface can be easily combined into a single C-V2X chipset. Therefore, automotive OEMs and infrastructure developers do not need to spend extra to enable both modes.
Smoother traffic. Cooperative Intelligent Transportation Systems (C-ITS) rely on real-time data sharing to make traveling on the road safe and seamless. When all cars are connected to a mobile network, it becomes easier for C-ITS to provide timely and reliable information about traffic conditions and road hazards. For instance, under DSRC or direct C-V2X, cars will only receive information on the approach of an ambulance when it approaches within a few hundred meters. This may not be a sufficient distance to ensure every vehicle gets out of the way in time, especially under heavy traffic. However, when all vehicles are connected to the mobile network, the entire traffic can prepare for emergency situations well ahead of time.
More powerful route planning. Again, since DSRC and direct C-V2X only allow a vehicle to communicate with nearby units that are within a “relevant” distance of usually 300 to 500 meters, it cannot foresee situations beyond this limit. Even though this distance is sufficient to ensure a safe and smooth experience at the current moment, it does not help interactive route planning because it is not possible to project the traffic flow on the roads far ahead. V2N can help autonomous vehicles to plan well ahead of time and choose optimized routes based not only on real-time traffic information, but also based on projected future traffic from the planned routes of other vehicles.
Economies of Scale. V2N enables the collection of vehicle and traffic data into cloud servers. Having such enormous panel data is especially helpful for road infrastructure improvement. After machine learning, AI-generated predictive models can be used to calculate optimized solutions for adjusting the lengths of traffic lights based on time of day or variating speed limits based on weather condition. The big data also open a world of new opportunities and business models that can be integrated with the in-vehicle infotainment system, along with other possible features such as interactive parking, wireless car payment, and more.
Faster speeds. Since C-V2X is upgradable into 5G and 5G NR protocols, V2N will always be on par with the latest and fastest internet speeds available. Clearly, the speed of communication is a very crucial factor in autonomous driving safety. 5G and 5G NR chipsets will also allow vehicles to communicate with smartphones in a timely manner, truly enabling V2P (vehicle-to-pedestrian) communication, which would remarkably improve pedestrian safety and save millions of lives.
AutoCrypt V2X, the Foundation for the Future of V2N
Whether it be DSRC or C-V2X, cybersecurity is the foundation that keeps these technologies evolving. As V2N connects the entire world of traffic via the cellular mobile network, the industry is expected to face unprecedented cybersecurity threats. AUTOCRYPT takes this threat very seriously. AutoCrypt V2X has been working with OEMs and smart infrastructure projects around the world. With profound expertise in encryption and PKI technology, it plays a crucial role in building a safe environment for V2N.
To keep informed with the latest news on mobility tech and automotive cybersecurity, subscribe to AUTOCRYPT’s newsletter.
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