Data from Cars for Evidence

Not unexpected.    We give up all kinds of data now.  More is coming. 

Insecure Wheels: Police Turn to Car Data to Destroy Suspects' Alibis

NBC News, By Olivia Solon

Law enforcement agencies increasingly are using data stored in an automobile's onboard computers to solve crimes. Digital vehicle forensics can utilize data generated and stored by onboard computers to reconstruct where a vehicle has been and the behavior of its passengers. Law enforcement agencies generally focus on the vehicle's telematics and infotainment systems, which can reveal such things as the vehicle’s location and speed, the opening and closing of doors, voice commands, Web histories, call logs, text messages, which devices were connected to the vehicle, and more. Privacy activists are concerned about the lack of security built into onboard computers, as well as the dearth of federal laws to regulate what data can be collected by automakers and what can be done with it. ... ' 

Blackberry and IVY

 A long time examiner of how automobiles, today or in a more autinomos future, will link to more sensors and the web.   Also an early user of Blackberry devices in the enterprise, before they were driven under by the iPhone.    Is Blackberry back?   What are the key apps to watch for? 

BlackBerry shares rocket upwards on AWS deal to integrate sensor data in vehicles

By Jonathan Shieber in TechCrunch

BlackBerry shares shot up in early trading on news that the company will partner with Amazon Web Services to jointly develop and market its vehicle data integration and monitoring platform, IVY.

BlackBerry stock was up 35%, or $2.11, at the opening bell on the New York Stock Exchange. It’s a sign of both the potential market for smart vehicle services and the ability of Amazon businesses to boost the fortunes of businesses with its attention.

The former undisputed heavyweight of the smartphone market, BlackBerry has transformed itself into a provider of business security and information integration services, and it’s through this transformation that the company attracted the attention of Amazon’s web services business.  ... " 

Testing Self-Driving Cars in Extreme Conditions

Extremes of data can be important.  Now how are they folded into the tests being proposed?

Research Data Puts Self-Driving Cars to the Ultimate Test: Canadian Winter   By U of T News

Driving in snowy conditions.

A new dataset will train future autonomous vehicles to drive in winter conditions.

Researchers at Canada's universities of Toronto (U of T) and Waterloo collaborated with San Francisco-based artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure firm Scale AI to create a dataset for training future autonomous vehicles to drive in winter conditions.

The Canadian Adverse Driving Conditions dataset uses real-world scans of icy, snow-covered Canadian roads as a virtual training course for self-driving cars' algorithms.

U of T's Steven Waslander said most driving datasets are collected in summer, and self-driving algorithms trained on such data tend to be confounded in adverse conditions.

Waslander and Waterloo's Krzysztof Czarnecki compiled the new dataset over the past two winters, using a Lincoln MKZ hybrid equipped with cameras, a LiDAR scanner, and a global-positioning system tracker to record conditions across more than 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) of roads.

Scale AI labeled the data through computer and human image recognition, and further analysis and processing converted the data into a software-parsable format.

From U of T News

Mobility's Second Inflection Point

Historically interesting view.  What will it mean to have the automobile a major source of data that comes from human behavior?

Mobility’s Second Great inflection Point  in McKinsey

Radically new dynamics in the early 20th century transformed cars and, in turn, the world. Here’s why the next great inflection point is upon us, auguring changes no less profound.
here’s a well-known quote attributed to Henry Ford that he actually never said but that historians confirm he almost certainly believed: “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”1 The story resonates, of course, because we know what consumers circa 1900 thought mobility was supposed to mean, and we know from about 1920 onward what mobility in fact came to mean.

And still does. Indeed, the extent to which Ford’s (and his contemporaries’) automobile paradigm has endured is remarkable. One hundred years ago, mobility conjured cars and trucks, a space to park and the price at the pump, city streets and open roads. And more: “the freedom machine,” mass transportation, car dealerships, internal combustion. Congestion. Accidents. Pollution.

At the first great inflection point, the fundamental dimensions of transportation—cost, convenience, user experience, safety, and environment—saw “mobility” and “cars” become well-nigh synonymous. That was a dramatic shift from the previous several hundred years, when overland mobility meant horses, which people needed in ever-growing numbers. Emissions problems of a different sort than today’s were an unintended consequence. In 1894, the London Times ran the numbers: at prevailing rates, nine feet of manure would accumulate on city streets by the mid-1940s.  .... "

Nissan to invite Google onto Car Dashboards

A step forward on automotive driver/occupant interaction.   The rolling channel.  Closer than this, I think.   How will driverless vehicles effect/change this?

Nissan will invite Google into its cars’ dashboards starting in 2021 By Ronan Glon in Digitaltrends

Nissan and its major partners, Renault and Mitsubishi, have turned to Google for help in developing a brand-new infotainment system. The yet-unnamed software will begin booting up in dashboards all around the world in 2021 and help the Alliance reach its goal of building more connected vehicles by 2022. …. "

Self Driving Dataset

As in all intelligent  learning situations, you need lots of data to define the context, more than you think you need.  But smaller amounts can help you start defining the process.

How Do Autonomous Vehicles Learn to Drive? Download This Self-Driving Dataset and See for Yourself   By ZDNet in CACM

The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) has made available a massive dataset used by engineers in the development of driverless auto technologies, featuring more than 100,000 high-definition video sequences that represent different driving situations.

The downloadable BDD100K dataset is part of the university's DeepDrive project, and it also contains global-positioning system locations, inertial measurement unit data, and timestamps across 1,100 hours.

Such datasets are needed to train systems on how to deal with different environments and driving conditions.

The BDD100K also has two-dimensional bounding boxes that have annotated approximately 100,000 images with notable objects such as traffic signs, pedestrians, bicycles, other vehicles, trains, and traffic lights. .... "

Car of the Future, Selling your Data?

Well, Yes.  Somewhat different in an automotive channel due to context and changing location.

The Car of the Future Will Sell Your Data
As smarter vehicles become troves of personal information, get ready for coupon offers at the next stoplight.

By Gabrielle Coppola  and David Welch in Bloomberg.

Picture this: You’re driving home from work, contemplating what to make for dinner, and as you idle at a red light near your neighborhood pizzeria, an ad offering $5 off a pepperoni pie pops up on your dashboard screen.

Are you annoyed that your car’s trying to sell you something, or pleasantly persuaded? Telenav Inc., a company developing in-car advertising software, is betting you won’t mind much. Car companies—looking to earn some extra money—hope so, too.  .... " 

Uber Shows Data and Op Visualization Tools

Impressive examples of visualizing data especially for non technical consumption.  Animated examples at the link.

Uber shows off its autonomous driving program’s snazzy visualization tools  by Devin Coldewey in TechCrunch.

Uber’s engineering blog has just posted an interesting piece on the company’s web-based tool for exploring and visualizing data from self-driving car research. It’s a smart look at an impressive platform, and definitely has nothing to do with a long piece published last week lauding a similar platform in use by one of Uber’s most serious rivals, Waymo.

Okay, maybe it has a little to do with that. The piece, over at The Atlantic, is quite interesting, but seemed rather to suggest that Waymo is unique in its approach to improving its autonomous cars’ AI. In fact, it’s likely that every company working on this stuff has a pretty similar approach, at least if they’re keeping pace with the state of the art.  ... " 

  

Baidu and a Free OS for Cars

Quite an interesting play.  Open source OS for self driving cars.  An unexpected thing from a player like China via Baidu.  Maybe free but not open source?    In Technology Review:

Baidu Will Release a Free Operating System for Self-Driving Cars
China’s leading search engine hopes to speed development of autonomous driving and draw car makers to its services.     by Will Knight  ... 

Smartphone Mechanics

Good thoughts.  Don't know how practical this is of yet,  but it maps out what standards and capabilities exist today.   A good starting point for using your phone as an automotive maintenance predictive device.   Also a good indicator of what you need for other systems.

Your smartphone: The mechanic in your pocket
You can use your Android or iOS device to gain access to a wealth of information about your vehicle’s operation.   ... By Michael Connell, Computerworld 

Cars Learning

 More broadly, what kinds of things can cars learn to make them better and cheaper?   Gets to better understanding the consumer needs and related processes.   Have been there.

Machine Learning and Data Are Fueling a New Kind of Car
Here’s why Intel just offered $15.3 billion for Mobileye, an Israeli company that specializes in machine vision and learning for cars.  ... by Will Knight ...

Making Roads Smarter

Roads need to get smarter too.  Infrastucture needs to act as part of an Internet of Things.  An article from CACM:

States Wire Up Roads as Cars Get Smarter   by The Wall Street Journal  ...   To prepare for the day when self-driving cars will travel on technology-aided roads, U.S. state transit planners aim to outfit those roadways with fiber optics, cameras, and linked signal devices to make traffic safer and more efficient. ... Planners say the technology will lead to faster trips, fewer accidents, and fuel savings. ... " 

Thinking Drive-Through Data

Been involved in several drive-through retail analyses.    So this is interesting.  It is pointed out that this will allow the connect of your car generated data to your Amazon online purchase data.  Deserves some thought.  In the Atlantic.