Nearly two years after Volkswagen was caught cheating on EPA tests, the German automaker has been doing its best make amends to its diesel customers, at home and abroad. We’ve examined several ways that VW could engineer its way out of the crisis, which at this point involves heavy emphasis on electric vehicles (EVs).
Earlier this year, Volkswagen launched a U.S. EV infrastructure subsidiary to the tune of $2 billion USD, with plans to install more than 500 charging stations across the country.
Setting aside questions about whether the means justify the ends, there remain the mysteries of the motives and methods of VW’s engineers. We’ve tackled the first issue before, but the second is only now coming to full light.
An international team of researchers recently uncovered the methods that allowed VW to circumvent U.S. and European emissions testing for at least six years.
"We were able to find the smoking gun," said Kirill Levchenko, a computer scientist from UC San Diego. "We found the system and how it was used. We found evidence of fraud right there in public view.”
It all started when computer scientists at Ruhr University, working with independent researcher Felix Domke, teamed up with Levchenko and the research group of computer science professor Stefan Savage at the Jacobs School of Engineering at UC San Diego.
The team examined 900 versions of the code used in VW engine control units and found that 400 of those included information to circumvent emissions tests. A specific piece of code was labeled as the "acoustic condition" ostensibly for controlling the sound the engine makes.
In reality, however, the label became a euphemism for conditions occurring during an emissions test.
The code allowed for as many as 10 different profiles for potential tests. When the computer determined that the car was undergoing a test, it activated emissions-curbing systems, which reduced the amount of nitrogen oxide emitted by the engine.
"The Volkswagen defeat device is arguably the most complex in automotive history," Levchenko said. "Dynamometer testing is just not enough anymore."
Interestingly, the researchers also found a less sophisticated ploy for the Fiat 500X. That car's onboard computer simply restricts its emissions-curbing system to run for the first 26 minutes and 40 seconds after the engine starts—roughly the duration of many emissions tests.
The researchers noted that for both Volkswagen and Fiat, the vehicles' engine control unit is manufactured by automotive component giant Robert Bosch. Car manufacturers can enable the code by entering specific parameters.
The researchers will present their findings under the title, "How They Did It: An Analysis of Emission Defeat Devices in Modern Automobiles" at the 38th IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy.