After the recent events involving more than one hacked connected car, major car makers decided to create a joined alliance to coordinate their efforts against cyber attacks. But without any Governmental approval is the right strategy?

The status of the Connected Car sector

The main issue for connected car manufacturers in the last year has been how to ensure privacy compliance given the very large volume of personal data collected through a connected car. For this reason, 19 makers of cars and trucks sold in the US committed to preserve the privacy of their customers on the basis of principles jointly agreed by them.

However, the last months have been very “agitated” for the connected car market with cyber attacks against different connected car vehicles which led to considerable costs necessary to return such vehicles, to a relevant negative publicity for the connected car market as a whole and to discussions in the public opinion on whether statutory obligations shall be imposed on connected car vehicles.

The reaction of car manufactures

I have already outlined in a previous post my view on what should be the appropriate reaction to such events. It is not possible to limit the growth of the connected car market given that they are already all around us and have massive potentials. Companies need to adopt a privacy and security by design approach, but at the same time a cooperation between the industry and regulators is necessary to create a more established framework to ensure privacy and security in a manner that is also financially feasible for car makers.

I already discussed about the issue by the Online Trust Alliance (OTA) of draft privacy and security guidelines, but now the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers and the Association of Global Automakers are forming a new group. The result is the Information Sharing and Analysis Center (ISAC) that has the purpose of increasing the cooperation between automakers in dealing with cyber attacks in order to develop the most appropriate technology for their connected car vehicles.

However, the lack of validation by regulators risks to put car makers in a “limbo” which might refrain them from performing the appropriate investments in the connected car market in a period when such investments are crucial to exploit the potentials of the Internet of Things market.

What is your view on that?

@GiulioCoraggio