$10 million grant allows Liberty and Virginia Tech to work together to improve smart car and smart drone communications

With smart car technology on the rise, Liberty University is stepping forward to develop programs to help make smart cars safer. Liberty will work closely with Virginia Tech in a collaborative effort of each school’s unique specialties. Both schools were awarded the Virginia Commonwealth Cyber Initiative Grant to help with the process.

The $10 million grant was split among schools in four sections of the state. Virginia Tech and Liberty are both in the southwest section, or node, of the state. Virginia Tech is heading the project. While there is not yet a full name for the project, the intent is to create protected connection between drones and smart cars.

“It’s a nice marriage between the schools, because we bring the drone expertise and they bring the car expertise,” Harper Allen, Liberty’s executive director of the Center for Cyber Excellence said. “We’re going to work together to make them communicate securely.” 

Virginia Tech and Liberty make perfect partners for the project because each school has a different specialized team which complements the project. Liberty’s autonomous drone program is state-of-the-art, and Virginia Tech owns a top-notch autonomous car program according to Allen.

Allen is heading up the program from Liberty’s end. He is working closely with Jonathan Washburn from the School of Aviation on
the project.

The premise of the endeavor is to create safe communication between smart cars and smart drones, which has not been done before, according to Allen. Virginia Tech will help develop a simulation of a car with its communications, and at Liberty, the team will work with the drones and make the two talk. The team wants to make the communication completely secure so it cannot be hacked maliciously. 

“What if a hacker was able to take over the drone and then fly over a car and make the car crash?” Allen said. “If we can’t get them to communicate securely, that means we’re actually introducing a risk, and we don’t want to do that.”

As an ethical hacker with years of experience, Allen is confident the team can be successful.

“It’s vital that if there’s any communication, it needs to be safe,” Allen said. “And that’s my specialty.”

The plan is to build the system and, using ethical hacking techniques, simulate what hackers would do to compromise the security. Any weaknesses the teams find tell them where more safety measures need to be put in place for future prevention.

Allen says he is grateful for the ability to work alongside Virginia Tech on such a hugely impactful project. 

“It’s exciting to us. It’s an honor to be able to work with Virginia Tech. They bring a tremendous amount of experience and capability,” Allen said. “We look forward to learning with them.”

Robert Locklear is news reporter. Follow him on Twitter.