outlines a potential to lock the vehicle out on weekends only so that the driver can still access a job

Because, of course, jobs requiring weekend work can't possibly exist.

Especially for someone who's having trouble paying their auto loan.

In case you have been living under a rock, there is an active war against middle class. Punitive taxes, barriers to run small business and so on and so on.

Middle class struggling to pay bills is part of the Agenda 2030, by that time everyone should be equally poor.

If you think that's bad wait till you see what Plan 2025 is - it's a bet to see how many credulous people fall for made-up conspiracy theory bullshit on social media. We seem to have arrived at the peak two years early.

A non payer taking a sledgehammer to said vehicle once it's locked him out for non payment.

Well, it will have the cameras on. Then, when you hit the car with said sledgehammer, it will trigger the accident detection circuits and automatically call to 911 (or 112, or whoever) and will be streaming the camera footage as evidence to the improper authorities.

911

This is a Frod, not a Porsche.

> it will have the cameras on

Which is why I'll be wearing the gorilla suit. Maybe the tiktok or Youtube revenues will cover the payments on my next car.

wow, ubik was not supposed to be an instruction manual

Another reason to never buy a Ford.

Personally I stopped buying Fords after the Great Silent Recall Incident. Apparently there was a known problem with the thermostat in several models made in the early 2000s. They would sometimes fail, without warning. I was driving one such vehicle when the thermostat failed. Getting to where it could be fixed was… interesting. There was no charge for the fix… except for the possibility of heating damage to the engine, that is. All because Ford couldn’t be bothered to issue a recall. Sold it quickly. Never bought a Ford since. This reinforces my position.

As if Ford being a good friend of Hitler wasn't the good enough reason?

Personally, I'm not going to hold a company responsible for the attitudes of its founder who died over 30 years before I was born. Putting this kind of software into the product, however...

They should at least have decency to change their name to distance themselves from their founder.

Given they have not done it, it seems like they don't mind their past.

Like IBM?

That's a really strange obsession you have there.

"As if Ford being a good friend of Hitler wasn't the good enough reason?"

From what I can recall, IBM also assisted the National Socialist party in their organization efforts.

And sold them punch-card tabulators that were eventually used to track people in the Holocaust.

My dad used to have a Sierra. It was actually quite a good car, but he'd bought it because it was relatively cheap to maintain, and he was a cab driver, so got heavy use.

That said, my one memory of the car happened on the hottest day of the year. I was one of four adults in the car, and the thermostat had failed a day or so before. Dad decided to keep the engine cool by turning the heating on, thus venting the heat from the engine in to the passenger cabin. We all opened our windows, but still sweated enough that not only did it soak our clothes, but I swear that's the only car journey I've taken where I lost weight in the car.

Friends don't let friends buy Fords.

My wife got a Fiesta, refitted for methane by the dealer. IIRC, it has about 70k kilometers, and we've already paid over 50% the cost of the car in exceptional maintenance. Oh, and we can't drive over about 90 kph during the summer, lest it overheats, and apparently they can't fix this problem. Part of this screwup of a car has been blamed on the methane conversion, but since it was done by the dealer pre-sale, as far as I'm concerned it's still Ford. Never again. I had a Fiat before, which had a few problems, but nowhere near as much, or as expensive, as the Ford.

My current Hyundai has covered the same distance by now, and it has had exactly zero exceptional maintenance. I haven't even changed a lightbulb.

Why something like this is even patentable?

"Why something like this is even patentable?"

Where have you been for the last twenty years? They would patent breathing if they could.

They can't?!

Of course they can! They just have to add "using a computer|the cloud|blockchain" somewhere in the patent filings.

If patenting it stops anyone except Ford from doing it, I'm all for that.

"If patenting it stops anyone except Ford from doing it, I'm all for that."

Patenting means everyone will still do it, but a big chunk of the money will go to Ford.

They'll have to add some ability for the car to put its wheels back on and get down from the bricks.

Fix Or REPO'd Daily.

F'k Ford.

You might have title for the vehicle but FORD will always own it. (You can replace FORD with TESLA and a few other makes)

Found On Road, Dead.

Financial Outage Repossession Directive.

Fubar'd Old Retired Dodge

... you know, instead of going to a dealership, it locks the user inside and proceeds to move at high speeds on the wrong way of an Interstate... while disabling the forward collision sensors...

Of course, we all know it will be so secure that no-one will be able to hack in and steal your car remotely... don't we..?

1. Payment dispute or outright error by loaner - car is automatically repossessed (self-repossessed? self-possessed?) despite owner being up to date on payments.

2. Hackers turned car thieves. "Car, owner is behind on his payments, so please park yourself in this nicely RF-shielded shipping container..."

(Edit: Ninja'd by AnotherName!)

Payment dispute or outright error by loaner - car is automatically repossessed (self-repossessed? self-possessed?) despite owner being up to date on payments.

As someone who spent part of this morning dealing with a warning letter about an invoice that I'd already settled, I agree that incompetency on behalf of the debt issuer is a worry...

So, have Ford come up with a name yet? I vote for "CHRISTINE":-

Car Hire Response Intelligent System Targetting Imbursement Null Enduser

If I was to go into a car showroom and pay for the car in cash, by a bank loan or other external means of funding, will this still be enabled? Or will I always be at risk of my car turning against me accidentally, maliciously or otherwise? I'd want a written guarantee that the 'feature' had been fully disabled or I would walk away from the purchase. Mind you, if it had keyless entry and/or start, I wouldn't buy it without the ability to disable that 'feature' too.

In a similar vein, I collected my new car last week, coincidentally a Ford. When I was being shown the gizmos, we came to the satnav, including the history of the previous owner. When I asked about resetting the car to factory settings, I was met with a blank stare. When I explained that I didn't want the previous owner's details in my car - or worse, them having the ability to do things to the car via their phone - I was told that there was a reset option within Settings... but they didn't know anything about it and wouldn't recommend using it "in case it broke anything".

Obviously I paid no heed and performed a factory reset myself. Believe it or not, the car didn't explode or stop working and now has no record of the previous owner.

But it's frightening the amount of data that Ford (and I guess the other manufacturers) collect and store about you. My only hope is that it has a 2G or 3G SIM card as those systems are getting shut down within the next year or so.

@Wally Dug

If in Europe that sound like a nasty GDPR breach by the "dealership" selling the car.

With all the (IMHO needless) crud on modern cars that links to peoples phones then would expect a responsible dealership would have done a "reset" to get rid of any PII - otherwise there could be obvious PII from sat nav history giving address clue, Bluetooth phone linkage potentially leaving a contacts list in the car. Not to mention dubious phone linked apps that include "find my car" functionality (that some vehicles have now) which could let the ex owner see where the new owner keeps the car.

If you buy a second hand phone from a phone shop they have (in my experience) always reset the phone.

Car dealers should similarly treat a modern car as something that can leak lots of PII and clear its data as appropriate.

@tiggity

It was bought from Europe's largest independent family-run car dealership*. And regardless of the personal details stored within the car systems, the Motability contract of the previous owner was in the glovebox, complete with their name and address in a covering letter. What's that about personal details?

As has been mentioned in various stories over the years on El Reg and others, car dealerships have a long way to go regarding resetting cars that they have up for sale, hence why I specifically asked. And as I don't have a mobile phone (yes, really!) I won't need to add one... but the car expects me to as there is a button that takes up literally a quarter of the home screen offering me to "Add Phone". No!!! I don't want - or need - to.

*Which coincidentally suffered a cyber attack on 23 December 2022.

Aren't patents supposed to describe things that actually exist, not some wishful thinking to use as a blunt instrument to wield a decade from now?

We don't have reliable "supported by a driver" automation, so where are these cars that can competently drive themselves back to the mothership?

Not anymore in the US

Patents are just mechanisms used by rich companies to gatekeep access to technologies anyone could come up.

In the UK, I believe they do. In the US, it seems they can patent anything. For instance, Apple patented a rather cool looking (IMO) Macbook dock that was essentially an iMac that you slid your Macbook into the side of, so you could use your macbook as if it were an iMac. They never built such a device, and, TBH, not sure how much difference the patent made for them. Even if someone else did build an iMac shaped dock, Apple have probably copyrighted the designs, and have all sorts of other legal protection on it.

The UK was working hard to make the European patent system as bad as the US. Thanks to Brexit, the EU has a better chance of putting some kind of limits on their patents.

Benoît Battistelli is French. For once it wasn't our fault, Brexit or otherwise.

"As mentioned, it could also move itself to a repossession agency or junkyard."

Well, it is a Ford after all...

As mentioned, it could also move itself to a repossession agency or junkyard.

I'd check existing patents/parents granted to Apple for that last point. They'd probably want the iDrivers to update to the next revision of the iCar in accordance with their update cycle

.... stolen from Ukraine spring to mind

They used to be pretty good on breaking a few miles or days out of warranty.