Self-healing learning system for one or more vehicles

• US 10,303,460 B2
• Filed: 07/24/2018
• Issued: 05/28/2019
• 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:
  US16/044,454
• Publication Number:
  US 20190034185A1
• Time in Patent Office: 308 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 to at least one vehicle, comprising:

receiving 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 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 an ECU software change based on the determined software vulnerability; and

sending a multi-dimensional delta file configured to change software on the ECU with the identified ECU software change wherein;

the multi-dimensional delta file comprises position-independent code,

the software on the ECU is mapped to a plurality of functional units,

the ECU is configured to utilize a virtual file system (VFS) to manage and track one or more versions of each of the plurality of functional units, and

the identified ECU software change comprises a prompt to adjust the ECU from executing a first version of ECU software to a second version of ECU software.

2. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the at least one vehicle includes a plurality of vehicles being monitored as a group.

3. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 2, wherein the plurality of vehicles includes a first set of vehicles having a common ECU type.

4. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 3, wherein determining the software vulnerability comprises:

determining a software vulnerability affecting the first set of vehicles.

5. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 4, wherein determining the software vulnerability further comprises:

determining, based on the ECU activity data, a second set of the plurality of vehicles potentially affected by the software vulnerability.

6. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 5, wherein sending the multi-dimensional delta file configured to change software on the ECU with the software change comprises:

sending a plurality of delta files to the first set and the second set of vehicles.

7. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions further comprise:

configuring, in response to the prompt and based on a multi-dimensional delta file corresponding to the second version of ECU software, the second version of ECU software on the ECU for execution; and

configuring, in response to the prompt, the first version of ECU software on the ECU to become non-executable.

8. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein the second version of ECU software is deployed subsequent to the first version of ECU software.

9. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein the second version of ECU software is deployed prior to the first version of ECU software.

10. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein the second version of ECU software is the first version of ECU software having one or more functional units disabled by the VFS.

11. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein the multi-dimensional delta file comprises startup code integrated into the multi-dimensional delta file and configured for executing the multi-dimensional delta file in the ECU.

12. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the ECU software change comprises an installation agent for installing the ECU software change on the ECU.

13. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the ECU software change is configured to recalibrate ECUs in the plurality of vehicles.

14. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions further comprise:

instructing the ECU of the at least one vehicle to reboot in response to the ECU software change.

15. A system for automatically providing software changes to at least one vehicle, the system comprising:

one or more processors; and

one or more memories having instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform the operations of;

receiving 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 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 an ECU software change based on the determined software vulnerability; and

sending a multidimensional delta file configured to change software on the ECU with the identified ECU software change, wherein;

the multi-dimensional delta file comprises position-independent code,

the software on the ECU is mapped to a plurality of functional units,

the ECU is configured to utilize a virtual file system (VFS) to manage and track one or more versions of each of the plurality of functional units, and

the identified ECU software change comprises a prompt to adjust the ECU from executing a first version of ECU software to a second version of ECU software.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the at least one vehicle includes a first set of vehicles having a common ECU type, and wherein the one or more processors are further configured to perform the operations of:

determining the software vulnerability affecting the first set of vehicles; and

determining, based on the ECU activity data, a second set of vehicles potentially affected by the software vulnerability.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to perform the operations of:

sending the ECU software change to the first set and the second set of vehicles.

18. A computer-implemented method for automatically providing software changes to at least one vehicle, the method comprising:

receiving 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 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 an ECU software change based on the software vulnerability; and

sending a multi-dimensional delta file configured to change software on the ECU with the identified ECU software change, wherein;

the multi-dimensional delta file comprises position-independent code,

the software on the ECU is mapped to a plurality of functional units,

the ECU is configured to utilize a virtual file system (VFS) to manage and track one or more versions of each of the plurality of functional units, and

the identified ECU software change comprises a prompt to adjust the ECU from executing a first version of ECU software to a second version of ECU software.