The dark side of self-driving cars

Americans love technology! And why not? Since the days of refrigerators, dishwashers and automatic washing machines, tech has done nothing other than make our lives better and better.

The only other thing we love as much as technology is cars! All the more reason, then, to celebrate self-driving cars, right? Google is at the forefront right now in the rush to bring this new technology to market. BMW and Volvo also have their names and vehicles out on the streets and in the media for their efforts. There are probably others and will certainly be more.

Those of us who would barely ride a bus to the hospital, even if boarding it would save our lives, are already thinking about the convenience, safety and free time self-driving cars will deliver to our lives. Finish getting dressed on the way to work. Learn Spanish or Arabic. Listen to motivational tapes from Bill and Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Kerry. Or perhaps grab an extra hour of sleep on the commute into work. If they are self driving – why do they need windows? Ride-sharing among coworkers could become even more popular!

But are self-driving cars like refrigerators, dishwashers or washing machines? Those devices stay put in our homes; they don't flash their fancy automation out in public. Nor do they expose their circuitry to those with malicious or profitable intent. "Hmm … I thought I programmed it to take me to the office. How did I end up in L.A.'s no-man (or woman's) land instead? What do you mean, the battery is dead?" Well, in your next life sue them.

Amazon is likely salivating at offering both surface and drone delivery to its customers. Police can load the vehicles up with cameras, toss in a stingray to collect cellphone calls and analyze the data dump at the end of the day. NSA can run private-label espionage services for governments and corporations by collecting wifi traffic, analyzing it and furnishing various levels of reporting based on subscription services. Corporate espionage firms will boom. Even old-fashioned, he-said, she-said private detective agencies will likely get in on the fun. They may just sell to the highest bidder.

Let's face it: Hacking these vehicles isn't a possibility; it's a certainty. It might be a kid spoofing you, trying to make you crash. Maybe a gang that's going to reprogram your destination and part out both you and your vehicle. Heck, they could even operate from overseas via your onboard Internet. Professional criminal gangs already orchestrate crashes on freeways and busy streets to bilk insurance companies; why wouldn't they turn to hacking as well? A skilled team of such experts could probably hack you right up into a semi tractor trailer, bolt the door and take you and the vehicle anywhere they wanted.

Then there's the problem of all those people out there – the ones who drive vehicles for a living. UPS, Federal Express, taxi drivers, consumer delivery drivers and a whole lot more. They may not have the smarts or inclination to join a criminal gang and cash in on the new technology. Does that mean we just add them to the unemployment rolls? Disability? Let them compete for jobs with all those legalized illegals our fearless leaders in Washington, D.C., want to add to the population?

Somehow, self-driving cars just don't seem very well thought out to me. The penalty for not thinking this out before we do it is going to be very large, indeed.

The visible dark side of self-driving cars isn't the worst. The invisible side is far darker.

Media wishing to interview Craige McMillan, please contact [email protected].