Researchers have found a way to hack Tesla and activate Full Self-Driving for free

By: Bohdan Kaminskyi | 04.08.2023, 22:15
Researchers have found a way to hack Tesla and activate Full Self-Driving for free

A team of researchers has discovered a method to hack into a Tesla car's infotainment system to unlock Full Self-Driving (FSD), heated seats and other paid features.

Here's What We Know

Three students from the Technical University of Berlin and an independent researcher used a method called "voltage glitching". It can be used to change the power supply to the AMD processor of an infotainment system.

"If we do it at the right moment, we can trick the CPU [...]. It has a hiccup, skips an instruction, and accepts our manipulated code", the researchers said.

The attack not only unlocks the heated seat functions, which costs $300, but also gives unlocks the encryption key. It's needed to authenticate the car to Tesla's network. In theory, this could open the door to activating even more features, such as enabling FSD even in regions where the technology is banned.

The voltage disconnect operation requires physical access to the car. However, this research could pave the way for attackers who have the ability to get into a Tesla inappropriately with it

Source: Gizmodo