Connectivity – the foundation of our lives these days.
From the smartwatch on your wrist to the connected refrigerator in your home and the car in your parking space, every modern offering receives its respective ‘performance’ and ‘security’ updates over the air.
Over-the-air updates are a vast subject however; this post will discuss car OTA updates
What are automotive OTA updates?
An automotive OTA update can patch a security vulnerability of a modern car, enhance its performance, or turn on a feature within the car that was not available to the owner initially but has been made available after the owner ‘subscribed’ the feature.
One of the many enticing facts about automotive OTA updates is that they can be sent to a car via Wi-Fi, cellular networks, and even the cloud. This multi-platform approach makes automotive OTA updates a coveted technology among global car manufacturers.
How do OTA updates for cars work?
Automotive OTA updates work in the following manner.
- A new software or firmware update is created and released by the OEM to its cloud
- The update is sent to the targeted users via cellular, Wi-Fi, or the cloud itself
- A pop-up shows up in the infotainment or MID screen of the user’s car
- The update is installed in the vehicle after the action is confirmed by the car owner
How do modern vehicles get OTA updates?
Car OTA updates are received by modern cars from their OEMs directly via the connected Wi-Fi of the owner’s smartphone or the cellular network of the embedded SIM card within the car’s infotainment system.
After the update is received, it is installed in the vehicle after receiving permission from the car owner. Just like a connected car tracking device, your connected vehicle is ready to address your needs. While connected to the vehicle, the OEMs also collect essential data points from the customer’s vehicle, such as GPS data, ECU data, speed, etc.
What are the advantages of automotive OTA updates?
Much like the humble car tracker that had become the norm for car owners, receiving automotive over-the-air updates is also slowly but surely becoming the norm.
Why?
Well, OTA updates for cars bring the following benefits with them.
- Maintaining, fixing, and improving the overall experience of a vehicle becomes easy since it is done remotely.
- OTA-updated cars remain safe both for the owner and other motorists on the road since issues with the car are fixed quickly.
- OTA updates help lock or unlock inactive features within a car only when the vehicle owner ‘subscribes’ to the said feature. This allows the car maker to generate additional revenue from their cars especially when the car in question is in the midst of its product life cycle.
- OTA updates allow OEMs to collect relevant data from their customer’s cars. In this way, they can predict possible future issues with a car and send fixes for the same before the issue(s) actually shows up in a car.
How secure are OTA automotive updates?
Just like the humble car GPS tracker has come a long way from being a luxurious option to being a part of the entire car ownership experience, the automotive OTA updates scene is also going through a lot of changes. One of those changes is addressing the security concerns associated with car OTA updates.
Unlike the initial days of car OTA updates, the modern generation of automotive OTA updates are shielded against –
- Spoofing
- Tampering
- Privilege permission alterations or
- Information leakage
Why do cars need OTA updates?
Just like you need a GPS tracker for car to keep it safe, your modern connected car needs OTA updates for -
- Map information updates
- Audio experience upgrades
- Infotainment and MID user interface optimization
- Car infotainment app updates
- In-car experience updates
- Powertrain performance fixes
- Updates for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS)
OTA updates are now part of the connected car experience
If you bought a modern car, the vehicle will automatically get OTA updates. However, when it comes to route planning, theft protection, or gas expense calculations, you cannot do that without the help of the best GPS tracker for car – remember that!