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Ambulances In Sweden Will Be Able To Hijack Car Radios During Emergencies (digitaltrends.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Digital Trends: The Swedish government wants to make it impossible to be caught off guard by a speeding ambulance. Sure, their sirens are loud -- but soon they'll be able to take over your car's radio. Swedish students at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm have developed a way for emergency vehicles to transit radio signals to warn other vehicles of an approaching truck. It's called the EVAM System, according to Phys.org, and it's designed to send a signal over a specific FM radio band that'll interrupt music or radio and display a test message over the system's tuner display -- so long as the car is equipped with a Radio Data System (RDS). The number of crashes caused by muted sirens is on the rise, Florian Curinga, one of the students working on the project, said. That's because of improved sound insulation in cars. Emergency vehicles in Stockholm will begin testing the system this year. The EVAM System can also predict how far in advance the message needs to be broadcast, depending on traffic speed, according to Phys.org. It may also be helpful in warning drivers about upcoming accidents, the students added. EVAM will work on two-thirds of all vehicles on the road, Curinga said. All drivers need to do is have their radio systems turned on. If a message is broadcast then, they'll see it -- and hear it -- from the tuner.
you can buy one of those devices on a Chinese website for $20 with free shipping so that someone can broadcast a message to the car behind them that they need to stop tailgating.
That's a promise.
---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.
Just because you aren't a radio listener, doesn't mean other people aren't. Lots of Swedes uses car radios - it'll work for those. The ambulance then have fewer people like you to navigate around, and will get there faster.
Lots of people already uses RDS because it is also used to warn them about traffic jams and other road problems. So this use fits perfectly.
What do you mean this is stupid?
What you call stupid, I predict will become hours and hours of fun and laughter.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
So this is just another application of RDS? This is just using an existing system for the purpose that it was designed, with the slight modification that it is installed on an ambulance?
Film at 11.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Years ago, I seem to recall an internet video. Was it Swedes listening to a car radio? I can't quite recall. Two parents in the front seats of the car. Two young girls sitting in the car's back seats. The video was a commercial for learning English. In the commercial, the two children understood the, um, shall we say, not so family friendly lyrics being played over the radio in English. The parents didn't understand the lyrics. The mom began to rock her head and snap her fingers to the music. The two children snicker at each other. Then the commercial fades to text that says Learn English . . . and name of a company that offers lessons.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
Emergency workers have been hijacking sound waves with sirens... the nerve!
love is just extroverted narcissism
No reason that a modern in car system could not be made to
With the way automobile manufacturers develop and update their "infotainment" systems, in 10 years half of the manufacturers will get this into half of their lines, enabled in half of the trims for half of the models, and it'll only half work.
Tesla will have a beta version next week, but will have to roll it back because it causes the car to drive into the nearest tree. Elon Musk will somehow blame both the driver and the tree in one fell tweet.
And direct it generally forward (instead of omni) and with more bass?
In addition, install hydraulics in the ambulance so they can jump and hop. And some gold plated spinner rims. All that always seems to get attention. Arm the ambulance driver with a military grade pistol he can point out the window at others sideways, and they will have no problem getting people out of the way. Might even pick up a few they wouldn't have otherwise.
Oh the fun I can have with this!
Now I can tell other drivers exactly what I think of their driving skills over their radio; because you know this is going to be hacked in like an hour after the first one is sold.
Wait to local gov's, city, state and national bureaucrats around the world get to try this.
You will be in "insert city name" in 25 minutes.
Welcome to the city of "insert city name"
Thank you for visiting "insert city name"...
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Careful what you play over that radio. If it's sudden and noisy, a jumpy driver might swerve and actually cause an accident.
"Everybody's naked underneath" -- The Doctor
These messages are usually only about the situation on the roads: places where there have been accidents that impact the flow of traffic on large roads and so on. And once the message is over, your radio reverts to whatever it was doing before the interruption. I find these messages very useful, even if most of them are not about the roads I am on: the one time I was on a road affected, I was able (thanks to being told well before I got to it) to take a detour around the site of an accident, and save myself an hour or two of sitting in a traffic jam.
This RDS system can be turned off if you want to, in which case your radio will not play any of the traffic messages broadcast.
Full disclosure: I live in Sweden. I also happen to love the RDS messaging system, even if I am rarely need the information provided.
Haven't listened to the radio in years, it used to be tape, then CDs, now it's a USB stick. I'm far from alone in this.
Same. That doesn't mean that my car doesn't get updates via RDS and display them on my dashboard while I'm rocking out to whatever is on my phone at the time. This is how most navigation systems in Europe including some standalone units currently get traffic updates. It's just a logical extension to a very actively used system.
This sounds like a waste of money and likely not that effective. What could work, perhaps, is if you put a dashcam on the ambo and use plate recognition for those assholes who don't make way and simply forward the videos to the police for the application of a heavy fine. Do it enough times and not only would you generate revenue, but those who have to pay the tickets will either learn expensive lessons or not be able to afford a car anymore. Win-win!
Even though it's for a good reason, I cringe every time I hear something about 'taking over' what's mine, bought and paid for. The root cause of this is bad driving habits, not lack of communication. If a driver doesn't notice the flashing lights and siren they aren't operating the damn vehicle properly, IMO.
Perfect way to distract a driver with something they've never seen before, just as they need to not be distracted.
This is off on several levels.
a) Getting data based updates through the radio is not something drivers have never seen before. It's actually pretty damn common.
b) What do you mean with just as they need not be distracted? Distracted from what? From the thing they aren't paying attention to, can't hear and can't see in the first place? I actually have an app on my phone which while providing local traffic info also provides me notification of incoming emergency vehicles including a little radar screen showing where they are coming from. It's a great advanced notice that I get long before I see a siren so I know when to expect a vehicle to whizz past or borderline rear end, or undertake, or cut down the breakdown lane etc.
So, the article claims that 'number of crashes due to muted sirens (because of sound insulation) is on the rise'. That's a claim with no numbers behind it, what is this increase in accidents per year - 10? or 10,000? In the latter case, I can see a justification for this research with the (unfortunately not too safe) assumption that people do use their radios often. However it just as likely to be the first case of trivial increase, which might as well be due to higher traffic!, but is used to justify an expensive study for some PhDs.
Every car needs to allow its audio to be interrupted by emergency vehicles. I mean what happens when there are level 4 or 5 autonomous vehicles? They will need to recognize and pull over when they see flashing lights approaching or hear sirens. Non-autonomous cars can have the same sensors built on the outside to detect emergency vehicles and when it detects an emergency vehicle it should reduce volumes to a reasonable level
and maybe say "emergency vehicle approaching from behind".
You're just being facetious because you've never seen RDS before. We've had this system for a good 20 years in Europe. It's just a new application of it.
Tesla's safety record makes your crude joke fall flat.
If you're playing that stick through the car's audio system then it shouldn't be a problem for the system to flip over to FM and alert you.
Please cite their safety record controlled against miles driver and vehicle age. (Hint: It's not great.)
Actually, if the difference between life and death is 30 seconds, then a paramedic getting to you 30 seconds sooner will make all the difference. Take it from a paramedic.
Tesla will have a beta version next week, but will have to roll it back because it causes the car to drive into the nearest tree. Elon Musk will somehow blame both the driver and the tree in one fell tweet.
That was Paul Walker, and it was a Porsche.
Learn to love Alaska
"Far from alone" != "Majority". Hell, it doesn't even equate to "significant minority".
And should we make it illegal to listen to anything that isn't RDS compliant? Will we start making phones RDS complaint, so if someone is using a phone (legally hands-free, or illegally hands-on) the calls will be interrupted as well?
How about people like me that don't even hook up the FM antenna? My "radio" is used primarily as a display for the rear camera, and secondarily for music for long trips, through bluetooth or USB. Am I now an illegal? Does it matter that I drive a special-edition car that has no soundproofing, and thinnner window glass, making the inside about as transparent to outside sounds as a "regular" car with the windows down? (noise being why I never use the radio in town, it's just so hard to hear)
Learn to love Alaska
You may be "far from alone" but that doesn't mean no-one else ever listens to the radio. Plenty of people do.
But I guess it wouldn't be Slashdot without at least one commenter extrapolating from their sample size of one (plus a few) to the entire rest of the population.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Raspberry pi, no additional hardware required. $35.00USD out the door. OOOOOhhhhhhhhhhh your a government?! I meant to say 3500000/ each. My mistake.
You are being ripped off every second of every day, so that advertisers can help rip you off even more tomorrow.
So they're going to spend $$$$$ for something of marginal use. Unless they can take over my USB, in which case I'm screaming bloody murder.
The student's pitch makes it sound like this is a government backed project. It is not. Right now, it's a student's project, and a potentially future startup idea, but nothing more than that. Whether this idea will be backed by the government is another matter entirely. Also, countries like Norway are already turning off analog FM broadcasting beginning this year in favor of digital FM. The UK and others will follow after that. Even if the AM band remains, this idea can not be implemented on the AM band which is designed to travel much longer distances than FM.
As to digital HD FM, I have no idea how that works. Could such a project be able to hijack digital FM signals without revisions to the current digital FM standard? Maybe yes, maybe not. Perhaps, someone who knows more about digital FM could chime in about this.
But like you said between USB music, telephone calls, 4G/3G music, satellite radio, AM analog radio, CDs, etc. Digital FM radio may constitute only a tiny portion of what people are actually listening to in their car. And one could argue that the problem with ambulances is not that drivers can't hear them/see them, it is that some drivers just act stupid when they hear/see an ambulance behind them.
a) Getting data based updates through the radio is not something drivers have never seen before. It's actually pretty damn common.
Perhaps where you are, but certainly not where I am. I have never seen such a system -- I didn't even know there was such a thing until I read this article.
Why would you scream bloody murder
Might interfere with the rhythm of my super eurobeat.
Have gnu, will travel.
RDS enabled radios usually have an option to pause any playback, and play the RDS stream.
You mean this one?
This post is encrypted twice with ROT-13. Documenting or attempting to crack this encryption is illegal.
Helicopters are hellaspensive.
Fun fact. There is only 1 news helicopter in San Diego, run by CBS8. The other stations buy footage from CBS8. Think about it. Have you ever seen SkyFox? The helicopters for channels 6 or 10? Nope. It's cuz they don't exist.
Tesla will have a beta version next week, but will have to roll it back because it causes the car to drive into the nearest tree. Elon Musk will somehow blame both the driver and the tree in one fell tweet.
That was Paul Walker, and it was a Porsche.
To be fair, Paul Walker was the passenger in that accident.
I imagine one's perspective of the value of everyone else getting the hell out of the way is in direct proportion to the likelihood he's a passenger in the ambulance.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
It is not as stupid as you might think. Essentially all radios sold for use in cars today come with the RDS system as part of them, although it can be turned off. What this system does is give you some info: the channel you are listening to and so on. It also gives the radio the current time. But most importantly it also allows for interrupting _any_ sound source (radio, CD, DVD, USB....) to force your radio to play the voice message sent through the RDS system
Does it work if your radio is off. I rarely have the radio on. I will ocassionally turn it on for a few minutes on long car rides but almost never when in the city with traffic which is where this type of system would be the most useful.
Way back in the 1980's a road tunnel here in Oz would take over your car radio when you entered, the voice told you what to do in an emergency.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
I think Google Maps already does that when it's navigating, but that actually sounds useful if you're just commuting to work for example.
We have a similar system in the US called Amber Alert, which broadcasts information on kidnapped children directly to your phone (amongst other things). It sounds great in theory, but then you realize that the alerts goes out to an entire state, and all 38 million people in California can be woken up in the middle of the night for something that happened 200 miles away. And since most people aren't on the road, it's pretty useless for them to receive it.
Or this one
Most units will interrupt whatever audio source you are listening to if you have the RDS "announcements" function on.
Handy for traffic accident warnings etc.
Won't that become an extremely dangerous "feature" once people start spoofing the signal for various reasons (such as clearing traffic, or sending someone into a ditch)?
A very similar system (also using RDS) was trialed in the Netherlands in 2008, and is in common use these days.
I've heard it in action once or twice, and it works well. Coming up on an intersection, the alert came long before I could see the ambulance approaching (it was obscured by buildings).
The radio has to be on for it to work, it has to receive the coded FM signal to know when to switch channels.
I usually just have my radio on, but muted if I'm just driving around.
Eat the rich.
Has everyone forgotten James Dean ?
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
It is not stupid. All cars our family has owned for the last 20 years (8 cars, 4 different brands) have interrupted USB/BT/AUX/CD when an RDS Traffic Announcement is broadcast as long as this feature has been enabled in settings.
And what is your USB stick plugged into? Probably a car stereo, which (if you live in Europe) already has RDS.
RDS has some handy functions, like the ability for traffic announcements to interrupt anything else you're listening to, including sources like USB.
This can be switched on/off (look for RDS TA in your manual).
Why would you be screaming bloody murder when this system warns you of an incoming emergency vehicle?
Read the article, it says that most cars already have support for it. I imagine that they use the Traffic Announcement feature which is set to interrupt normal listening. I have used this function in cars from Ford, Volvo, VW, Toyota, Renault and Audi without issues. The last car I can remember using without this feature was my 1984 Mazda 323 with a factory mounted radio.
I have RDS in my car now for more than one decade. Though in the previous country I was expat it did not do any good.
The thing with RDS is that is only transmitted in certain frequencies, and you must be listening to radios stations in that frequency for it to work, if I am not wrong.
If I am, I would be thankful if someone knows better.
I don't listen to the radio either - my phone is plugged into the USB cable. However, when driving through the blackwall tunnel in London recently, my radio stopped playing my music and instead broadcast a warning (that was also being broadcast on speakers in the tunnel) over and over.
So it's definitely possible.
The normal news in the radio or TV are mind numbing.
They also do not have the wisdom in the radio to including regular updates about traffic to get my interest while driving. Anyway, the technology is making them quickly redundant.
The music is also pretty insipid/bland and horribly commercial, and there is zero incentives to listen to that garbage...
RDS here does little much more than tuning me into a station that I am tuned that supports RDS when in the hourly news they talk slightly about traffic. Pretty much useless in my 20-minute daily commute around the city.
If it happens for the times to overlap, and I hear about a traffic jam, by the time I hear it, I am already pretty much in the middle of it.
How quaint :)
I love stacking my barbecues in the shed at the end of summer - you can't beat a bit of grill on grill action.
My Volvo manages to interrupt for Traffic Announcements even if I am listening to a different radio station than the one broadcasting the TA. I have also seen this in some of my older cars, but not all. All cars however have interrupted other sources than radio if a TA is broadcast.
Yes, you're a very special snowflake. We get it.
CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
I hope they are not going for patent on the idea. I got prior art as I presented this same idea back in 1991 as a presentation to a class. This is rather simple idea as well, Authorized Vehicle Interruption System. The thing that was funny was no one I presented the idea to believed it would be allowed by governments because it could be hacked pretty easily as the RF frequencies are not encrypted.
Anyways, It is always fun to see an idea you had like 20+ years ago start to be implemented. I bet this idea has been around since the Car Radio has been invented. The idea is simple enough.
I can program myself out of a Hello World Contest!!
If they mandate it then all new cars will have it. They did that with running lights, they are doing it with accident reporting cellular systems. The cost to implement it is extremely low, far less than those two examples.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Has everyone forgotten James Dean ?
Rock on.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
I've had RDS in cars since at least 2003. Several 100K miles driven. Not once, ever, have I received anything over RDS.
Should a TA truly be able to interrupt radio playback I predict hackers will employ annoyance transmissions within days, making it the shortest lived feature/policy ever.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
As of 2004, there were ~530,000 deaf and hard-of-hearing people in Sweden (Encyclopedia of Deafness and Hearing Disorders, p.197.)
So basically 5% of the population isn't going to hear the radio announcements, even if they have their radio on. Which they probably don't, or it's tuned to Sirius Satellite or plugged into their iPod/iPhone.
About as useful as touch screens for amputees whose prosthetic hands can't capacitively couple with trackpads or iPhones...
If the weather is not right, you now have to deal with the consequences of a helicopter crash, in addition to (or as a replacement to) your original emergency.
It does not work with the radio off. If you want the traffic announcements without having to listen to the radio (or any other sound source), there is one trick that can be used: turn the radio on, and choose some sound source (you could eg choose to play a CD, and just let the radio wait for you to press the Play button). Then turn the volume down to zero. Most radios with RDS have one volume setting for the "normal" sound, and another for RDS messages.
In my experience, there are two slightly separate message services on RDS: one set of messages cover the large roads (think interstate in the USA), and another set of messages cover smaller roads. The messages concerning the large roads are broadcast all over the country, but the messages covering smaller roads are only broadcast in the appropriate county. This may be wrong, but it is what I have experienced from driving long distances once or twice a year for the past 10-15 years.
RDS here does little much more than tuning me into a station that I am tuned that supports RDS when in the hourly news they talk slightly about traffic
For you maybe. Last time I drove in Sweeden my car picked up traffic updates and road blocks via RDS and the GPS mapped around it accordingly accordingly. I can also push a button on my radio to get a current list of traffic congestions on my dash. No listening to news required.
It's common in most of Europe. Even my last 15 year old (I think it would be now) beater had a button on the radio to display traffic delays on the dashboard in a sequential list. The ancient GPS unit which predated displaying maps in cars could route around problem routes even then.
Unfortunately much of the rest of the world relegated RDS to just displaying the station name on the radio which is a colossal waste of technology.
As someone helpfully pointed out above, it was a Dutch video.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
Not just Europeans, sir. But everyone else in the world. America is number one.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
But I guess it wouldn't be Slashdot without at least one commenter extrapolating from their sample size of one (plus a few) to the entire rest of the population.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Tesla will have a beta version next week, but will have to roll it back because it causes the car to drive into the nearest tree. Elon Musk will somehow blame both the driver and the tree in one fell tweet.
That escalated quickly.
Fantastic video, in fact the lyrics pop into my head from time to time and bring a smile to my face.
Interestingly, my kids are doing French immersion school, and I don't speak French. I expect something similar might happen to me in a couple of years.
BlameBillCosby.com
An option I always disable. The RDS stream was unfeasibly rarely useful that it's not worth the distraction.
Surely a better answer is to just prosecute drivers that are too fucking stupid to realise that there's an emergency vehicle right behind them, they're in the way and everybody else has already made room.
Can you guarantee it will only ever alert me to emergency vehicles that I may otherwise obstruct? Because if not it's actually fucking dangerous, causing an unnecessary distraction let alone the incentive to ram the annoying fucking vehicle making all the fucking noise.
I don't like sirens.
Well, according to the RDS standard, there are different RDS channels and priorities. There's even one for 'catastrophes'.
And, while I agree that drivers should put more attention on what's happening around them, as the article states, the really good sound insulation of modern cars does reduce the effectiveness of ambulance's sirens. So IMHO, this RDS 'hack' could really help a bit.
Where can I get one for MY car?!
br> This would be a great tool to clear the idiots out my way, avoiding STUPID drivers!!!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
Lots of people are exceptions. The mechanism given only works if the radio is on and tuned to FM. By a strict reading of the mechanism, AM (popular in the US) would prevent operation of RDS. As well as the growing number of people who play music from devices without using FM.
That I'm only one example doesn't mean I'm special. I see around 1% of drivers in the morning with headphones on. One would assume they aren't using their car's FM radio with headphones.
Learn to love Alaska
It's a no-brainer if you think about it. If enough people do have a RDS-enabled stereo with an actual antenna hooked up to it, most of them will get the warning. That means that a good portion of the cars in front of you will slow down/form a passageway/drive onto the shoulder/whatever. I'd say seeing that happen in front of you *might* give a subtle hint that something's up which in turn *might* be sufficient motivation to briefly shift your attention from the smartphone to the rear mirror to notice an oncoming emergency vehicle at which point you can consider the out-of-band RDS warning delivered. :)
Those people driving with headphones? They don't have an aux-in jack on their car stereo.
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It wont be slashdot without idiotic answers like yours. Wise up, it is not the 90s anymore.
Have you ever driven? If 80% of the drives in front pulled over, the 20% who didn't would pull into the open space and floor it. I've seen lots of people cut off or tailgate emergency services. I've pulled over, completely off the road, and stopped before an intersection, so I left it clear for the approaching fire truck. The person behind me pulled in behind me, but failed to stop completely, and hit me. He saw the truck, pulled over, and slowed, but missed the car in front, and managed to hit me.
Perhaps you drive on different roads, where drivers are polite and attentive. But that's not the roads I've driven. And yes, I've driven in Europe, though not Sweden.
Learn to love Alaska
Perhaps you should wise up to the fact that not everyone is like you, wants to be like you, or should aspire to be like you. People listen to radios in their cars in their millions. Complaining that it's "not the 90s" any more won't do anything to change that fact. Other people have different opinions about things to you. Sounds like you have a problem with that, for some reason.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.