Tanker Truck Shut Down Via Satellite

unassimilatible writes "Satellite Security Systems, in cooperation with the California Highway Patrol and InterState Oil Company, demonstrated the first wireless remote shutdown of a fully loaded, moving gas tanker truck. Described as "a viable solution to the challenge of controlling rogue hazardous waste vehicles that could pose a threat to homeland security," satellite communications were used to disable the truck in seconds, 530 miles from the demonstration site. But that's not all. California Assembly Bill (AB) 575 (PDF link) would require truck disabling devices, global positioning or other 'location reporting systems' on all hazardous material haulers. With all of the police pursuits in California, can mandatory GPS and disabling devices in all vehicles be far away?"

Comments

So much for homeland security

[Anonymous Coward]

Imagine the US gets attacked by an organised force. Suddenly, the enemy has the full ability to completely disable the transport infrastructure. Not only that, with a minimum of their own vehicles they can have a replacement that they fully control within days.

This sounds to me the beginning of the end

Re:So much for homeland security

[velo_mike]

Actually if you want to look it up, most of the erosion of rights like this started with the clinton administration. Bush is merely has been keeping the status quo

Now I'm not debating the erosion of rights under clinton, but let's not pretend that he started the ball rolling.

Remember Regan's "war on some drugs" which has given us asset forfeiture , drug tests, mandatory minimum's and long jail substances for users (violating the 4th ammendment). Remember also that Ed Meese, Regan's attorney general,tried valiantly to outlaw pornography and other "filth".

When will law makers get it?

[Chris_Stankowitz]

Criminals don't acquire anything using the same means as law abiding citizens and companies (i.e: Guns, drugs /perscription or otherwise/, and in this case hazourdous material. Although this could be used to stop hijacked trucks, it won't stop the guy with a *van* full of materials that was stolen.

You can't legislate away these kinds of problems.

/me slaps forehead and sighs

The problem with this.

[Anonymous Coward]

As a trucker, I'll weigh in on this. The systems on trucks are generally Qualcomm satellite systems. The problem with that being it relies on a line-of-sight link with the satellite. Going up a mountain, pulling under a fuel island, all sorts of normal operation things cut the signal. Lots of guys put trashcans over their dishes at night so dispatch won't bother them while they're sleeping.

So this fancy-shmancy Homeland Security plan can be defeated with a trashcan. Satellite signal blocked = No shutting the truck down remotely. And I know what you're all thinking, "What a redneck, we could just make it where X minutes of signal blockage shuts down the truck!" Right. And if there's a traffic jam in a tunnel, you'll just exacerbate it by having a dead truck there? This is just another of the gov't's "Big Ideas That Will Not Work."

It's easy to block those satellite signals, and it's not reasonable to put a timer on it so that X minutes of no signal == shut down truck.

Um, how is this the first?

[Llewrend]

I'm the sysadmin at a trucking company and we've had kill switches on engines as well as gps tracking for a long time. Most major carriers do, if not for hazmat, for pharmacuticals and baby formula. In fact, we have flowthrough to our EDI system so that our customers can track thier own loads if they want to and stop calling us about it. Anyone ever heard of AIRIQ?