Profits 1st, Safety 2nd?

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Message 1999959 - Posted: 27 Jun 2019, 16:16:31 UTC

Aside:

Is "Profits 1st, Safety 2nd?" now synonymous with the world of Boeing?


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Message 1999960 - Posted: 27 Jun 2019, 16:17:36 UTC - in response to Message 1999948.  

So... Pure conjecture of my personal opinion and total ignorance and all that... Is the existing flight computer now overloaded with extra software bloat and/or extra demands for the new MCAS? Was part of the original problem with MCAS that the software was (dangerously) restricted because the flight computer does not have enough capacity to include sanity/safety checks and voting across multiple redundant sensors?...
Those of us who read both here and in the Number Crunching forum might ask...

Do any of us know, or have a way of finding out, what make and/or model range of microprocessor is used in the onboard flight control system? Crunchers here are well placed to know that:

Microprocessors have recently been found to have security flaws in, particularly, the presumptive lookahead processing pipeline, used to enhance operating performance
Patches have been deployed to restore security
Deploying the patches has made the processors slower

So, even if the original Boeing processors were adequate for the job they were specified for, are they still, now, even adequate for that role - let alone the extra demands now being placed on them?
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Message 1999961 - Posted: 27 Jun 2019, 16:25:13 UTC - in response to Message 1999959.  

That could be a jest. Unfortunately, whether or not it was, it is apt to the point that the thread could just as well be: Boeing 1st, safety 2nd.

For the past quarter of a century at least, if not more, all aspects of logistics be it be Air Sea or Land, has succumbed to profits 1st with safety taking a back seat.
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Message 1999965 - Posted: 27 Jun 2019, 17:18:18 UTC - in response to Message 1999959.  

Aside:

Is "Profits 1st, Safety 2nd?" now synonymous with the world of Boeing?

Nope. Mandated by law in the USA. Called "The fiduciary duty to the shareholder." So not just Boeing, every public company. Washing machines, refrigerators, cladding, automobiles, the list is long. Some of you on the other side of the pond might begin to see a pattern.
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Message 1999966 - Posted: 27 Jun 2019, 17:26:30 UTC - in response to Message 1999965.  

Fiduciary duty=legalised murder as its cheaper to pay fines.
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Message 1999992 - Posted: 27 Jun 2019, 21:45:37 UTC - in response to Message 1999966.  

Fiduciary duty=legalised murder as its cheaper to pay fines.

Now you are getting the concept.
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Message 1999997 - Posted: 27 Jun 2019, 22:45:48 UTC - in response to Message 1999992.  

Yes, they learned it mostly from the automobile companies...

In a rear-end collision, the fuel filler neck could separate and puncture the fuel tank, spraying fuel into the passenger compartment and igniting. In an exposé in Mother Jones in 1977, it was revealed that Ford had known about the defect before the car even went to production, but decided it would be too expensive to fix — the cost to safely upgrade the fuel system would’ve added $11 to the cost of each car. A shield to protect the tank from rupturing would have only cost $1.

To make matters worse, a chilling memo from 1973 was leaked to the media that outlined (by Ford’s bean counters’ estimates) how many deaths to expect per year from the defect and how much it expected to cost the company per lawsuit. The memo ultimately decided that this was cheaper for the company than spending the money to fix the problem. By 1978, the public outcry was so strong that Ford reluctantly recalled 1.5 million Pintos (and the identical Mercury Bobcat), and made the life-saving modifications to the fuel system.


46 years gone and nothing changes.
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Message 1999999 - Posted: 27 Jun 2019, 23:04:38 UTC - in response to Message 1999997.  

46 years gone and nothing changes.
Yes, Boeing made a Ford Pinto as I said a long time ago in this thread, but few understood.
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Message 2000250 - Posted: 29 Jun 2019, 9:09:44 UTC
Last modified: 29 Jun 2019, 9:11:02 UTC

Report at Bloomberg that Boeing, in a cost cutting move, outsourced the 737MAX software to temporary $9/hr software engineers.

Bloomberg
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Message 2000253 - Posted: 29 Jun 2019, 9:58:50 UTC - in response to Message 2000250.  

The Max software -- plagued by issues that could keep the planes grounded months longer after U.S. regulators this week revealed a new flaw -- was developed at a time Boeing was laying off experienced engineers and pressing suppliers to cut costs.
Increasingly, the iconic American planemaker and its subcontractors have relied on temporary workers making as little as $9 an hour to develop and test software, often from countries lacking a deep background in aerospace .
Boeing still trying to absolve themselves of blame. Unfortunately, the one thing that will not change in this instance is that they are the aircraft assemblers who forward a completed aircraft for certification, while partly self-certificating it themselves.
Watching Boeing squirm is more hilarious than Gerald Ratner. :-)
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Message 2000255 - Posted: 29 Jun 2019, 10:00:49 UTC - in response to Message 2000250.  

Report at Bloomberg that Boeing, in a cost cutting move, outsourced the 737MAX software to temporary $9/hr software engineers.

Bloomberg

Thanks for that. Unfortunately, no surprise and no surprise that makes for scary reading...


So, how do we get the management and the bean counters to be personally responsible for their deadly dubious short-sighted superficial greedy motivations?


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Message 2000256 - Posted: 29 Jun 2019, 10:05:22 UTC
Last modified: 29 Jun 2019, 10:05:42 UTC

This is looking even more serious for the Flight Control Computer failings:


Boeing Needs Up to Three Months to Fix Latest 737 Max Problem

Catastrophic Category

In the latest setback, the FAA discovered that when the tail panel that adjusts the nose up and down moves on its own -- a failure known as a runaway trim -- the flight computer could impede a pilot’s response.

One of the first steps in such a failure is to use thumb switches on the control column to counter the movement. A pilot attempted that maneuver during the recent simulator test and found that because of the computer issue, the manual electric trim switches didn’t immediately respond.

That could lead the plane to enter a dive that would be difficult to recover from. The FAA pilot categorized it as catastrophic, which means it could result in a crash.

The problem occurred during a scenario that commercial pilots are highly unlikely to encounter, and doesn’t involve the flight-control software linked to the two crashes, according to one of the people. However, the resulting diving motion created by the runaway trim was similar to the problem faced by the Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines pilots on the flights that went down, killing 346.




So... In addition to the MCAS operation fault: Were the pilots unable to recover in time due to additionally a death-dealing delay on the response from the manual trim control due to an overloaded Flight Control Computer?...


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Message 2000260 - Posted: 29 Jun 2019, 10:38:04 UTC - in response to Message 2000256.  

It's becoming more and more common for a switch not to be a switch, but a computer input device: sends a message to the computer, which finishes whatever it was doing, thinks about it for a bit, and finally flips its own switch.

My last car had controls like that for the headlights.
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Message 2000288 - Posted: 29 Jun 2019, 16:03:08 UTC - in response to Message 2000260.  

It's becoming more and more common for a switch not to be a switch, but a computer input device: sends a message to the computer, which finishes whatever it was doing, thinks about it for a bit, and finally flips its own switch.

My last car had controls like that for the headlights.

Priority inversion? AoA sensor input higher priority interrupt than the pilot trim switch?
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Message 2000290 - Posted: 29 Jun 2019, 16:13:25 UTC

Computer thought - it's only a blob of water, fat and protein telling me to...
Human thought - if only that dumb lump of silicon do what I've told it to do...
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Message 2000631 - Posted: 2 Jul 2019, 19:09:21 UTC - in response to Message 1999960.  
Last modified: 2 Jul 2019, 19:14:44 UTC

So... Pure conjecture of my personal opinion and total ignorance and all that... Is the existing flight computer now overloaded with extra software bloat and/or extra demands for the new MCAS? Was part of the original problem with MCAS that the software was (dangerously) restricted because the flight computer does not have enough capacity to include sanity/safety checks and voting across multiple redundant sensors?...
Those of us who read both here and in the Number Crunching forum might ask...

Do any of us know, or have a way of finding out, what make and/or model range of microprocessor is used in the onboard flight control system? Crunchers here are well placed to know that:

Microprocessors have recently been found to have security flaws in, particularly, the presumptive lookahead processing pipeline, used to enhance operating performance
Patches have been deployed to restore security
Deploying the patches has made the processors slower

So, even if the original Boeing processors were adequate for the job they were specified for, are they still, now, even adequate for that role - let alone the extra demands now being placed on them?

Good thoughts and good questions...


From my ignorant personal viewpoint and unconnected understanding and random beliefs and 'I know nothing' from my reading around:

On the Boeing 737 series (including the deadly Max 'version'), there are two Flight Control Computers (FCCs) of which at any moment, one (the master) is helping the pilots to physically fly the aircraft and controls the aircraft control surfaces. The second will be active but in 'standby mode'.

The MCAS software runs on the FCCs.

Strangely, I can find no useful details on the FCCs other than what they control (the aircraft control surfaces) and that there are two of them.

The FCCs use 'old' microprocessors, they should be totally air-gapped, and so they have no need of such silliness as anti-virus or any Meltdown/Spectre/Side-Channel mitigation. There is no need as in all the code must be totally trustworthy and trusted and fully tested fully functional in the first place. Note that this is safety critical system stuff!


For the sort of hardware used, there will be a good comparison with the Flight Management Computer(s) (FMC) for the Boeing 737 family:

From "Boeing - Flight Management Computer", the latest FMC uses "a Motorola 68040 processor running at 60MHz (30Mhz bus clock speed), with 4MByte static RAM and 32MByte [ROM/storage] for program & database".

There are one or optionally two FMCs that are used for following the flight plan, navigation, and flight calculations for time and fuel and so on...


It is a good bet that the FCCs will be the same type of hardware but with much less RAM and storage. After all, they are a fixed function that should never change... They are used as fixed function control systems rather than general purpose computers.

If they even run an OS, it will be a specialist "Real-Time" Operating System that guarantees tasks complete to a strict milliseconds scale schedule. However, the Boeing 737 is old enough that (just my wild guess) the control program may well just be a programmed loop!

For the new MCAS software to 'lock up' or hopelessly slow down the FCC to deadly disaster suggests that the FCC software is likely merely a programmed loop... If so... Then that is SCARY! Deadly scary dangerous if there are no timing guarantees designed in there...


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Message 2000637 - Posted: 2 Jul 2019, 19:50:30 UTC - in response to Message 2000631.  

The FCCs use 'old' microprocessors, they should be totally air-gapped, and so they have no need of such silliness as anti-virus or any Meltdown/Spectre/Side-Channel mitigation. There is no need as in all the code must be totally trustworthy and trusted and fully tested fully functional in the first place. Note that this is safety critical system stuff!
Not so sure about that "air gap"
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/computer-expert-hacks-into-plane-and-makes-it-fly-sideways-according-to-fbi-10256145.html
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Message 2000679 - Posted: 2 Jul 2019, 23:31:12 UTC - in response to Message 2000637.  
Last modified: 2 Jul 2019, 23:36:53 UTC

The FCCs use 'old' microprocessors, they should be totally air-gapped, and so they have no need of such silliness as anti-virus or any Meltdown/Spectre/Side-Channel mitigation. There is no need as in all the code must be totally trustworthy and trusted and fully tested fully functional in the first place. Note that this is safety critical system stuff!
Not so sure about that "air gap"
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/computer-expert-hacks-into-plane-and-makes-it-fly-sideways-according-to-fbi-10256145.html


A curious find...

Quoting from that:

... The warrant describes how Roberts would wiggle and squeeze the Seat Electronic Box under his seat, which connected to the plane's in-flight entertainment system, or IFE.

He would then connect a cable to the box and connect it to his computer. From there, Roberts was able to hack into the plane's Thrust Management Computer using default IDs and passwords.

He overwrote computer code for the planes' thrust management computer, which he told agents allowed him to make the plane climb on his command.

At least once, according to the document, he told one engine on a plane to climb, causing the plane to move sideways as it flew.

Roberts also used software to monitor traffic from the cockpit, according to the search warrant request.

Roberts is a well-known and respected expert on computer security. He told the FBI he was furnishing the information "because he would like the vulnerabilities fixed."...



That simply, physically, should not be possible. There simply should be no network connection to such systems...

Heads must roll if that really is the case...



Design stupidity beyond belief?...

If that really is the case, then that man should be awarded a huge public service honour and monetary reward from a crippling fine, a truly crippling fine, levied on the misbegotten company that has built that shambles of an insecure will catastrophically fail plane...

Our lives really do depend upon that. And also the lives of any poor unfortunates in the 'wrong place' on the ground for where the wreckage ends up...


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Martin
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Message 2000693 - Posted: 3 Jul 2019, 1:10:20 UTC - in response to Message 2000679.  

The FCCs use 'old' microprocessors, they should be totally air-gapped, and so they have no need of such silliness as anti-virus or any Meltdown/Spectre/Side-Channel mitigation. There is no need as in all the code must be totally trustworthy and trusted and fully tested fully functional in the first place. Note that this is safety critical system stuff!
Not so sure about that "air gap"
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/computer-expert-hacks-into-plane-and-makes-it-fly-sideways-according-to-fbi-10256145.html


A curious find...

Quoting from that:

... The warrant describes how Roberts would wiggle and squeeze the Seat Electronic Box under his seat, which connected to the plane's in-flight entertainment system, or IFE.

He would then connect a cable to the box and connect it to his computer. From there, Roberts was able to hack into the plane's Thrust Management Computer using default IDs and passwords.

He overwrote computer code for the planes' thrust management computer, which he told agents allowed him to make the plane climb on his command.

At least once, according to the document, he told one engine on a plane to climb, causing the plane to move sideways as it flew.

Roberts also used software to monitor traffic from the cockpit, according to the search warrant request.

Roberts is a well-known and respected expert on computer security. He told the FBI he was furnishing the information "because he would like the vulnerabilities fixed."...



That simply, physically, should not be possible. There simply should be no network connection to such systems...

Heads must roll if that really is the case...



Design stupidity beyond belief?...

If that really is the case, then that man should be awarded a huge public service honour and monetary reward from a crippling fine, a truly crippling fine, levied on the misbegotten company that has built that shambles of an insecure will catastrophically fail plane...

Our lives really do depend upon that. And also the lives of any poor unfortunates in the 'wrong place' on the ground for where the wreckage ends up...
It worse than that ...
https://www.newsweek.com/flight-airplanes-can-now-be-hacked-ground-cyber-expert-warns-962420
"As far as I know I will be the first researcher that will demonstrate that it's possible to hack into communications devices on an in-flight aircraft…from the ground," he told Dark Reading this week. "We also managed to get access to important communications devices in the aircraft," he added.


I hate to put it this way, but the necessary skills are not being taught and drilled into the IT world. Assumption made, we don't plug the airplane, car, truck into the internet, therefore it is safe to have a default username of "root" and a password of <CR>! Same seems to apply to IoT devices. Heck even routers and switches. Until some third party who gets hit sues the life out of a IoT device maker because they didn't lock their device down it will keep on happening.
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Message 2000726 - Posted: 3 Jul 2019, 7:15:41 UTC

A few years ago Boeing were using members of the 8x86 family supported by DSPs from various manufacturers with some particular functions being handled by a Motorola chip. I guess they may have moved away from these in recent years, but probably stick with the i86 family. In addition there are quite a number of FPGA type chips in use.
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