Research

[IoT] Future Led by IoT

Security and Privacy for Cooperative Autonomous Vehicles

Principal investigator: AOKI, Shunsuke, Assistant Professor, Information Systems Architecture Science Research Division

While the development of technologies for autonomous vehicles that make use of various IoT sensors and communication devices has advanced rapidly, little progress has been made in utilizing the real-time data and stored data from IoT sensors in such systems. The main reason is that since autonomous vehicle systems are equipped with cameras, GPS receivers, and many kinds of sensors such as LiDAR, they collect privacy-sensitive information about people around the vehicle during operation. Furthermore, since autonomous vehicles are IoT control systems that put human life at risk directly, a high level of reliability and safety must be assured at all times. It is therefore difficult to design a system that takes data utilization fully into account.
To solve this problem and thus enable the use of autonomous vehicles as a sensor data collection platform for a future society, this PRESTO research proposal tackles the "development of a cooperative autonomous vehicle with safe data sharing." The project focuses on three specific research themes: (1) secure sensor data sharing technology with infrastructure-side IoT devices and other vehicles; (2) cooperative driving technology to avoid collisions and deadlocks of multiple autonomous vehicles for high reliability; and (3) a privacy protection mechanism to ensure that autonomous vehicles can be used as a secure data collection platform. Like this, the study aims at developing and designing autonomous vehicle systems capable of safely, securely, and reliably sharing data and cooperating with infrastructure-side IoT devices, other vehicles in the vicinity, and remote general users.
The study is expected to construct an autonomous vehicle system that shares driving data and sensor data in real time and dramatically improves not only the safety of the system itself, but also the overall safety and convenience of urban transportation, as well as the comfort and living environment of urban life.