IN-VEHICLE COMMUNICATION SYSTEM AND IN-VEHICLE RELAY APPARATUS

• US 20140297109A1
• Filed: 03/27/2014
• Published: 10/02/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 03/28/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Autonetworks Technologies, Ltd. (Sumitomo Corporation), Sumitomo Electric Industries Limited (Sumitomo Corporation), Sumitomo Wiring Systems Limited (Sumitomo Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Autonetworks Technologies, Ltd. (Sumitomo Corporation), Sumitomo Electric Industries Limited (Sumitomo Corporation), Sumitomo Wiring Systems Limited (Sumitomo Corporation)
• Inventors: SHIMOMURA, Yoshikuni, OKADA, Hiroshi
• Granted Patent: US 9,635,151 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/36
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/12 Applying verification of the received information cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for data integrity or data verification H04L9/32
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/125 involving control of end-device applications over a network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/40 for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity, e.g. service redundancy protocols, protocol state redundancy or protocol service redirection management of faults, events, alarms or notifications in data switching networks H04L41/06

Abstract

An in-vehicle communication system and an in-vehicle relay apparatus that can perform relaying between multiple in-vehicle networks if a new in-vehicle device is connected to a said in-vehicle network, and that can prevent, if an improper in-vehicle device is connected to the in-vehicle network, the entire system from being adversely affected by the improper in-vehicle device. The in-vehicle relay apparatus that relays information between the multiple in-vehicle networks has stored therein relay destination determination information necessary to determine a relay destination of information. If a new in-vehicle device is connected to any one of the in-vehicle networks, an acquiring unit communicates with a communication device to obtain updated relay destination determination information, a determination unit determines if the updated relay destination determination information is legitimate, and an updating unit updates the relay destination determination information of the in-vehicle relay apparatus.

Claims

1. An in-vehicle communication system comprising:

a plurality of in-vehicle networks respectively connected to at least one in-vehicle device; and

an in-vehicle relay apparatus that is connected to the plurality of in-vehicle networks and that relays information between the in-vehicle networks, the in-vehicle relay apparatus comprising;

a storage unit that stores relay destination determination information that is necessary to determine a destination of information to be relayed by the in-vehicle relay apparatus, and

a relay destination determination unit that determines, based on the relay destination determination information stored in the storage unit, another said in-vehicle network to which received information is to be transmitted if the received information is received from one said in-vehicle network, the in-vehicle communication system further comprising;

a vehicle external communication unit that transmits and receives information to and from a communication device outside of a vehicle;

an acquiring unit that acquires, using the vehicle external communication unit, updated relay destination determination information from the communication device outside of the vehicle;

a determination unit that determines if the updated relay destination determination information acquired by the acquiring unit satisfies a predetermined condition; and

an update unit that updates the relay destination determination information stored in the storage unit of the in-vehicle relay apparatus with the updated relay destination determination information if the determination unit has determined that the updated relay destination determination information satisfies the predetermined condition.

2. The in-vehicle communication system according to claim 1,

wherein the in-vehicle relay apparatus comprises a notification unit that gives out a notification if there is no said in-vehicle network to which the received information is to be relayed.

3. The in-vehicle communication system according to claim 1,

wherein each of the in-vehicle devices connected to the in-vehicle networks comprises:

a storage unit that stores reception determination information that is necessary to determine if information is to be received;

a reception determination unit that determines, based on the reception determination information stored in the storage unit, if information transmitted from the in-vehicle relay apparatus is to be received; and

a restriction unit that puts a restriction to prevent processing using the information transmitted from the in-vehicle relay apparatus if the reception determination unit has determined that the information transmitted from the in-vehicle relay apparatus is not to be received, and

wherein the in-vehicle communication system further comprises;

an acquiring unit that acquires, using the vehicle external communication unit, updated reception determination information for each of the in-vehicle devices from the communication device outside of the vehicle;

a determination unit that determines if the updated reception determination information acquired by the acquiring unit satisfies a predetermined condition; and

an update unit that updates the reception determination information stored in the storage unit of each of the in-vehicle devices with the updated reception determination information if the determination unit has determined that the updated reception determination information satisfies the predetermined condition.

4. The in-vehicle communication system according to claim 1, further comprising:

an information updating apparatus that includes the vehicle external communication unit, the acquiring unit, and the determination unit,

wherein the update unit is configured to update the relay destination determination information stored in the storage unit of the in-vehicle relay apparatus with information provided from the information updating apparatus.

5. The in-vehicle communication system according to claim 4,

wherein the in-vehicle relay apparatus further comprises:

a plurality of vehicle internal communication units that respectively transmit and receive information to and from the plurality of in-vehicle networks; and

an update communication unit that transmits and receives information to and from the information updating apparatus, and

wherein reception of information used to update the relay destination determination information stored in the storage unit is restricted to the update communication unit.

6. The in-vehicle communication system according to claim 1,

wherein the determination unit is configured to determine, as the predetermined condition, if the information acquired by the acquiring unit is legitimate information based on (1) a result of authentication processing performed with the communication device outside of the vehicle, or (2) digital signature information added to the information acquired by the acquiring unit.

8. The in-vehicle communication system according to claim 1,

wherein the relay destination determination information associates an identification of the information to be relayed by the in-vehicle relay apparatus with at least one of the in-vehicle networks.

9. The in-vehicle communication system according to claim 8,

wherein if the identification of the information to be relayed by the in-vehicle relay apparatus is not contained within the relay destination determination information, a notification unit of the in-vehicle relay apparatus sends a notification to an external device.

10. The in-vehicle communication system according to claim 1,

wherein the determination unit is configured to transmit the updated relay destination determination information to the updating unit, and

wherein if the updating unit receives the updated relay destination determination information from a source other than the determination unit, the updating unit does not update the relay destination determination information stored in the storage unit.

7. An in-vehicle relay apparatus that is connected to a plurality of in-vehicle networks respectively connected to at least one in-vehicle device and that relays information between the in-vehicle networks, the in-vehicle relay apparatus comprising:

a storage unit that stores relay destination determination information that is necessary to determine a destination of information to be relayed by the in-vehicle relay apparatus;

a relay destination determination unit that determines, based on the relay destination determination information stored in the storage unit, another said in-vehicle network to which received information is to be transmitted if the received information is received from one said in-vehicle network;

a vehicle external communication unit that transmits and receives information to and from a communication device outside of a vehicle;

an acquiring unit that acquires, using the vehicle external communication unit, updated relay destination determination information from the communication device outside of the vehicle;

a determination unit that determines if the updated relay destination determination information acquired by the acquiring unit satisfies a predetermined condition; and

an update unit that updates the relay destination determination information stored in the storage unit of the in-vehicle relay apparatus with the updated relay destination determination information if the determination unit has determined that the updated relay destination determination information satisfies the predetermined condition.

11. An in-vehicle communication system comprising:

a plurality of in-vehicle networks respectively connected to at least one in-vehicle device; and

an in-vehicle relay means for connecting to the plurality of in-vehicle networks and for relaying information between the in-vehicle networks, the in-vehicle relay means comprising;

a storage means for storing relay destination determination information that is necessary to determine a destination of information to be relayed by the in-vehicle relay apparatus, and

a relay destination determination means for determining, based on the relay destination determination information stored in the storage means, another said in-vehicle network to which received information is to be transmitted if the received information is received from one said in-vehicle network, the in-vehicle communication system further comprising;

a vehicle external communication means for transmitting and receiving information to and from a communication device outside of a vehicle;

an acquiring means for acquiring, using the vehicle external communication means, updated relay destination determination information from the communication device outside of the vehicle;

a determination means for determining if the updated relay destination determination information acquired by the acquiring means satisfies a predetermined condition; and

an update means for updating the relay destination determination information stored in the storage means of the in-vehicle relay means with the updated relay destination determination information if the determination means has determined that the updated relay destination determination information satisfies the predetermined condition.