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Hacker May Have Discovered Plans For A Tesla P100D (jalopnik.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the white-hat dept.

One computer wiz claims to have hacked into Tesla's firmware and discovered a reference to a juicier battery. Self-proclaimed white hat hacker, Jason Hughes, says he discovered a secret in Tesla's firmware 7.1, but he didn't want to tell the world outright what he discovered, so he made Tesla Motors Club forum-members work for it by obfuscating the secret with a hash. TheSHA256 hash, a one-way function, would either require forum members to guess and check to decrypt this code, or to look it up in a hash directory. Forum member LuckyLuke decrypted Hughes' hash and discovered its meaning: P100D. P100D is the nickname given to Tesla's upcoming 100-kWh battery pack that would give the Model S a range of 300 miles or more. In response to a fellow forum-member decrypting his secret code, Hughes responded on Twitter. On the forum, Hughes had some additional information to mention, saying: There have been references to the P100D in firmwares as early as 2 months ago. They finally added the badges to 2.13.77. I mucked it up a bit by adding a crappy background (it's a PNG with transparency in the firmware)... There are quite a few things that are in the firmware that I'm not prepared to share publicly. Just like the P100D has been in there for months with my lips mostly sealed. I don't want to spoil all of Tesla's surprises.

3 of 85 comments (clear)

  1. Good Grief by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 3, Insightful

    He's being awfully "cagey" about it considering he gave most of it away anything. Sounds like an attention seeker.

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  2. two questions by Quirkz · · Score: 2, Insightful

    1. Are you actually white hat if you're spilling secrets that aren't yours to tell?

    2. What the heck is a P100D? Couldn't that be squeezed somewhere in the paragraph?

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    1. Re:two questions by fonos · · Score: 4, Insightful

      1. Are you actually white hat if you're spilling secrets that aren't yours to tell?

      He looked at the firmware that was installed in a car the he (I presume) owned, and published his findings. If you want to keep something like this a secret don't distribute this "secret" in a firmware update that every single Tesla owner receives.