British boffin muzzled after cracking car codes

Here is a tale of two security research presentations, both looking at motor vehicle security in a world in which even the humblest shopping trolley now has more brainpower than a moonshot.

Flavio Garcia, a University of Birmingham lecturer familiar with insecurity in car systems – here, for example, is a paper he co-authored with Roel Verdult and Josep Balasch for 2012 – has been blocked from presenting to Usenix 2013, thanks to a House of Lords injunction requested by Volkswagen.

Volkswagen took exception to Garcia's intended presentation to the long-running and respected conference, entitled Dismantling Megamos Crypto: Wirelessly Lockpicking a Vehicle Immobilizer. As The Telegraph in the UK reports, Justice Birss of the Lords decided that publication of the paper would mean “car crime will be facilitated”. Megamos is the family of RFID chips used by a number of vehicle makers. VW asked Garcia to publish a redacted version of the paper, which he declined to do.