Self-healing learning system for one or more controllers

• US 10,678,627 B1
• Filed: 01/24/2020
• Issued: 06/09/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 07/25/2017
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Aurora Labs Limited
• Original Assignee: Aurora Labs Limited
• Inventors: Fox, Zohar
• Primary Examiner(s): Bui, Hanh Thi-Minh
• Application Number:
  US16/751,872
• Publication Number:
  US 20200159604A1
• Time in Patent Office: 137 Days
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2050/021 Means for detecting failure or malfunction
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 50/02 Ensuring safety in case of control system failures, e.g. by diagnosing, circumventing or fixing failures
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 50/0205 Diagnosing or detecting failures; Failure detection models
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 50/0225 Failure correction strategy
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 50/04 Monitoring the functioning of the control system
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 50/045 Monitoring control system parameters
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0721 within a central processing unit [CPU]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0751 Error or fault detection not based on redundancy power supply failures G06F1/30; network fault management H04L41/06
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/079 Root cause analysis, i.e. error or fault diagnosis in a hardware test environment G06F11/22; in a software test environment G06F11/36
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0793 Remedial or corrective actions recovery from an exception in an instruction pipeline G06F9/3861; by retry G06F11/1402; for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1433 during software upgrading
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1629 Error detection by comparing the output of redundant processing systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3612 by runtime analysis performance monitoring G06F11/3466
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/0284 Multiple user address space allocation, e.g. using different base addresses interprocessor communication G06F15/163
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/0646 Configuration or reconfiguration
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/188 Virtual file systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/57 Certifying or maintaining trusted computer platforms, e.g. secure boots or power-downs, version controls, system software checks, secure updates or assessing vulnerabilities
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/572 Secure firmware programming, e.g. of basic input output system [BIOS]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/577 Assessing vulnerabilities and evaluating computer system security
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2212/1008 Correctness of operation, e.g. memory ordering
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2212/1044 : Space efficiency improvement
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2212/1056 : Simplification
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2221/033 : Test or assess software
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/60 : Software deployment
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/65 : Updates security arrangements therefor G06F21/57
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/654 : using techniques specially adapted for alterable solid state memories, e.g. for EEPROM or flash memories
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/656 : while running
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/658 : Incremental updates; Differential updates
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/66 : of program code stored in read-only memory [ROM]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/71 : Version control security arrangements therefor G06F21/57; Configuration management
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4401 : Bootstrapping security arrangements therefor G06F21/57
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/445 : Program loading or initiating bootstrapping G06F9/4401; security arrangements for program loading or initiating G06F21/57
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/44521 : Dynamic linking or loading; Link editing at or after load time, e.g. Java class loading
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 20/00 : Machine learning
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 : Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

Disclosed embodiments relate to automatically providing updates to at least one vehicle. Operations may include receiving, at a server remote from the at least one vehicle, Electronic Control Unit (ECU) activity data from the at least one vehicle, the ECU activity data corresponding to actual operation of the ECU in the at least one vehicle; determining, at the server and based on the ECU activity data, a software vulnerability affecting the at least one vehicle, the software vulnerability being determined based on a deviation between the received ECU activity data and expected ECU activity data; identifying, at the server, an ECU software update based on the determined software vulnerability; and sending, from the server, a delta file configured to update software on the ECU with a software update corresponding to the identified ECU software update.

Claims

1. A non-transitory computer readable medium including instructions that, when executed by at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to perform operations for automatically providing software changes, comprising:

identifying a software vulnerability based on a deviation of activity data of a first controller from an allowed envelope of at least one operational attribute;

identifying a controller software change based on the identified software vulnerability, wherein the identified controller software change is configured to adjust the first controller from executing a first version of controller software to a second version of controller software;

sending, to the first controller, a first delta file configured based on the identified controller software change, wherein the first delta file is configured to cause the first version of controller software on the first controller to become non-executable;

identifying a second controller determined to be similar to the first controller; and

sending a second delta file, corresponding to the first delta file, to the second controller based on the determined similarity, wherein;

the first or second version of controller software is mapped to functional units and the first controller is configured to utilize a virtual file system (VFS) to manage and track one or more versions of the functional units, and

the delta file is configured to change a memory address of the first controller corresponding to one of the functional units and to disable one of the functional units.

2. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the at least one operational attribute is associated with processor activity or memory contents.

3. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the at least one operational attribute comprises a memory access pattern or a driver behavior attribute.

4. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the second controller is determined to be similar to the first controller based on rules associated with the first version of controller software or the second version of controller software.

5. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the allowed envelope is based on a model or map of observed functioning of the first controller.

6. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the first delta file comprises position-independent code.

7. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the first delta file is multidimensional.

8. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein the multidimensional first delta file comprises at least one of:

a binary data dimension, a source attribute dimension, and a map file dimension.

9. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the first controller is part of a plurality of controllers being monitored as a group.

10. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 9, wherein the second controller is part of another plurality of controllers being monitored as a group, and the first and second controllers are of a common controller type.

11. A computer-implemented method for automatically providing software changes, the method comprising:

identifying a software vulnerability based on a deviation of activity data of a first controller from an allowed envelope of at least one operational attribute;

identifying a controller software change based on the identified software vulnerability, wherein the identified controller software change is configured to adjust the first controller from executing a first version of controller software to a second version of controller software;

sending, to the first controller, a first delta file configured based on the identified controller software change, wherein the first delta file is configured to cause the first version of controller software on the first controller to become non-executable;

identifying a second controller determined to be similar to the first controller; and

sending a second delta file, corresponding to the first delta file, to the second controller based on the determined similarity, wherein;

the first or second version of controller software is mapped to functional units and the first controller is configured to utilize a virtual file system (VFS) to manage and track one or more versions of the functional units, and

the delta file is configured to change a memory address of the first controller corresponding to one of the functional units and to disable one of the functional units.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one operational attribute is associated with processor activity or memory contents.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein the at least one operational attribute comprises a memory access pattern or a driver behavior attribute.

14. The method of claim 11, wherein the second controller is determined to be similar to the first controller based on rules associated with the first version of controller software or the second version of controller software.

15. The method of claim 11, wherein the allowed envelope is based on a model or map of observed functioning of the first controller.

16. The method of claim 11, wherein the first delta file is configured to change the first version of controller software while simultaneously permitting execution of a code segment on the first controller.

17. The method of claim 11, wherein the allowed envelope is based on data from a third controller.

18. The method of claim 11, wherein the first delta file comprises position-independent code.

19. The method of claim 11, wherein the first controller is part of a plurality of controllers being monitored as a group.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the second controller is part of another plurality of controllers being monitored as a group, and the first and second controllers are of a common controller type.