ST Engineering is collaborating with Israeli automotive cybersecurity startup SafeRide Technologies to protect the autonomous (driverless) shuttles on Sentosa, which will operate in 2019, from cyberattacks.

The partnership will integrate ST Engineering's in-house cybersecurity capabilities with SafeRide's software suite (collection of softwares), vSentry™, to diagnose and eliminate potential cyber vulnerabilities from connected and autonomous vehicles.

"vSentry is a holistic solution which provides multi-layer security for the autonomous vehicles, the connected ECUs (the connected computers of the vehicle), and the fleet," says Yossi Vardi, chief executive officer and co-founder of SafeRide.

It combines two mechanisms: a conventional zero-false positive mechanism and a dynamic mechanism called "vXRay™" which uses machine-learning and deep-learning technologies to protect the vehicles against known and future threats.

"The robust security and value-added services that SafeRide's solution enables are key for supporting the AV projects as well as other leading industry innovations that ST Engineering drives," adds Mr Vardi, who foresees a long-term partnership with ST Engineering as it develops an array of vehicle platforms for many industry segments, all of which require security attention.

"Cybersecurity is one of the core capabilities that we are delivering in our products and solutions. With the rapid advances in vehicle technology, the need to safeguard the integrity and security of the systems becomes more urgent," says Lee Shiang Long, president of ST Engineering's Land Systems arm.

In early June 2018, ST Engineering started a three-month on-road testing of its autonomous mobility-on-demand vehicle on Sentosa.