BOOKOUT V.

TOYOTA

2005 Camry L4
Software Analysis

Michael Barr
 MICHAEL BARR
Embedded Software Expert
Electrical Engineer (BSEE/MSEE)

Experienced Embedded Software Developer

! Named inventor on 3 patents

Consultant & Trainer (1999-present)

! Embedded Software Process and Architecture for reliability
! Various industries (e.g., pacemakers, industrial controls)

Former Adjunct Professor

! University of Maryland 2000-2003 (Design and Use of Operating Systems)
! Johns Hopkins University 2012 (Embedded Software Architecture)

Served as Editor-in-Chief, Columnist, Conference Chair

Author of 3 books and 65+ articles/papers

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 BOOKS BY MICHAEL BARR

1ed: 1999; 2ed: 2006 1ed: 2003 1ed: 2008; 2ed: 2012

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 EMBEDDED SYSTEMS DEFINED

“Embedded Systems”
! Electronics + software for a dedicated purpose
! Many billion more new embedded systems each year
microwave ovens, digital watches, pacemakers, thermostats
You are surrounded by them (like it or not; safe or not)

Embedded systems in cars

! Modern cars contain networks of embedded computers!
Anti-lock brakes, airbags, speedometer, GPS, radio, …
! Some carmakers brag over 100 microprocessors inside!
Each headlight, each mirror, each seat, …
Barr Chapter Regarding
4 Toyota’s Operating Systems
 MY REVIEW OF TOYOTA’S SOURCE CODE

Access to Toyota’s “electronic throttle” source code

! In a secure room in Maryland
! Subject to confidentiality agreements
! For vehicle models with ETCS spanning ~2002-2010 model years
Camry, Lexus ES, Tacoma, and others

Approximately 18 months of calendar time with code

! By a very experienced team of embedded systems experts
Including 3 other engineers from Barr Group
! Building upon NASA’s earlier source code review; digging deeper

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 EXAMPLE C LANGUAGE SOURCE CODE
function

int larger_of(int a, int b)

{
if (a > b)
{ variable

return a; /* a contains the larger value */

}
else
{ comment
return b; /* b contains the larger value */
}
}
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 ELECTRONIC THROTTLE CONTROL

fdadg

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 TOYOTA’S ENGINE CONTROL MODULE (ECM)

Main CPU
(“V850”)
contains
software

Monitor Chip
(“ESP-B2”)
contains
software

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 SAFETY-CRITICAL SYSTEMS

Not all embedded systems can kill or injure people …

! Those that can do harm are “safety-critical systems”

What could possibly go wrong?

! A glitch in the electronics (random hardware faults will happen)
! A bug in the software (any reasonably complex software has bugs)
! An unforeseen gap in the intended safety features
! Or all three: glitch activates bug and that slips thru safety gap

Safety cannot be an afterthought; must be designed in

! Redundancy and fault containment are key
Barr Chapter Regarding
9 Toyota’s Watchdog Supervisor
 ELECTRONIC THROTTLE CONTROL (ETCS)

“Toyota ETCS-i is an example of a safety-critical hard real-time system.”

- NASA, Appendix A, p. 118

NASA, p. 13
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 SUMMARY OF 2005 CAMRY L4 CONCLUSIONS

Toyota’s ETCS source code is of unreasonable quality

! Toyota’s source code is defective and contains bugs
Including bugs that can cause unintended acceleration
! Code quality metrics predict presence of additional bugs

Toyota’s fail safes are defective and inadequate

! “House of cards” safety architecture
Random hardware and software faults are a fact of life

Misbehaviors of Toyota’s ETCS are a cause of UA

11 Barr St. John Report

 UNINTENDED ACCELERATION (UA)

I use the same definition as NHTSA and NASA:

! “any degree of acceleration that the vehicle driver did not
purposely cause”

NHTSA, p. vi

I also use the phrase “loss of throttle control”

! Throttle controls airflow, which controls engine power

12 Barr St. John Report

 NASA DID NOT RULE OUT UA BY SOFTWARE

13 NASA, pp.15-20
 THERE ARE DEFECTS IN TOYOTA’S ETCS

2005 Camry L4 source code and in-vehicle tests confirm:

! Some critical variables are not protected from corruption
Mirroring was not always done
Ø  NASA didn’t know this (believed mirroring was always done)
No hardware protection against bit flips
Ø  NASA didn’t know this (was told main CPU’s RAM had EDAC)
! Sources of memory corruption are present
Stack overflow can occur
Ø  NASA didn’t know this (was told stack less than half used)
There are software bugs
Ø  NASA found bugs (and Barr Group has found others)

Thus Toyota’s ETCS software can malfunction …

14 Barr St. John Report
 ETCS SOFTWARE MALFUNCTION

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 SOFTWARE MALFUNCTIONS HAPPEN

All kinds of embedded systems

experience partial software
malfunction from time-to-time
! e.g., most other apps working, but
phone calls go direct to voice mail
! “Have you tried rebooting it?”

The 2005 Camry L4 software has a

set of 24 “apps” (called “tasks”)
! All are meant to be running always
16 Barr St. John Report
 TOYOTA’S OPERATING SYSTEM (OSEK)

Barr Chapter Regarding

17 Toyota’s Operating Systems
 OSEK’S CRITICAL DATA STRUCTURES

Barr Chapter Regarding

18 Toyota’s Operating Systems
 MEMORY CORRUPTION AND TASK DEATH

0
Bit flip here kills 1 task!

Barr Chapter Regarding

19 Toyota’s Operating Systems
 EXAMPLE OF UNINTENDED ACCELERATION
speed (kph)

> 90 mph
Ø  Representative of task
task death death in real-world

Ø  Dead task also monitors

accelerator pedal, so
loss of throttle control
set speed
(68 mph) 30 second
ü  Confirmed in tests
unintended
speed
acceleration brake state Ø  When this task’s death
due to task (green) begins with brake press
(blue)
death; no fail
safe acts (any amount), driver
must fully remove foot
stuck throttle from brake to end UA
(red)
ü  Confirmed in tests

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Source: Loudon Vehicle Testing time (seconds)
SOFTWARE CAUSES OF MEMORY CORRUPTION

Type of Causes Memory Defect in

Software Defect Corruption? 2005 Camry L4?
Buffer Overflow Yes Yes
Invalid Pointer
Yes Yes
Dereference/Arithmetic
Race Condition
Yes Yes
(a.k.a., “Task Interference”)

Nested Scheduler Unlock Yes Yes

Unsafe Casting Yes Yes
Stack Overflow Yes Yes

Barr Chapter Regarding

21 Toyota’s Software Bugs
 SPAGHETTI CODE DEFINED

Ø  Difficult to follow data/control paths

Ø  Bugs likely to appear when modified
Ø  Unnecessarily complex

Ganssle&Barr, Embedded
22 Systems Dictionary, 2003
 TOYOTA’S SPAGHETTI CODE

TOY-MDL04983210

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 TYPES OF SPAGHETTI CODE

Data-flow spaghetti
! Complex coupling between software modules and between tasks
! Count of global variables is a software metric for “tangledness”
2005 Camry L4 has >11,000 global variables (NASA)

Control-flow spaghetti
! Many long, overly-complex function bodies
! Cyclomatic Complexity is a software metric for “testability”
2005 Camry L4 has 67 functions scoring >50 (“untestable”)
The throttle angle function scored over 100 (unmaintainable)

Barr Chapter Regarding

24 Toyota’s Code Complexity
 STACK ANALYSIS FOR 2005 CAMRY L4

OSEK Data
4,096 bytes
+ Recursion
94% (vs. the 41% Toyota told NASA!)

Recursion violates a MISRA-C rule

(1998: #70; 2004: #16.2)

1,024 bytes

Barr Chapter Regarding

25 Toyota’s Stack Analysis
 NASA’S VIEW ON RECURSION

NASA was concerned about possible stack overflow…

… and NASA didn’t know there was so little safety margin!

26 NASA, Appendix A, pp. 20, 129-134

 TOYOTA’S MAJOR STACK MISTAKES

Toyota botched its worst-case stack depth analysis

! Missed function calls via pointers (failure to automate)
! Didn’t include any stack use by library and assembly functions
Approximately 350 functions ignored
! HUGE: Forgot to consider OS stack use for context switching!

On top of that… Toyota used dangerous recursion

And… Toyota failed to perform run-time stack monitoring

! A safety check that the cheaper 2005 Corolla ECM had!
Barr Chapter Regarding
27 Toyota’s Stack Analysis
TOYOTA FAILED TO COMPLY WITH STANDARDS
Operating System Standards

“OSEK” is an international standard API

! Specifically designed for use in automotive software
! Multiple suppliers of OSEK operating systems
! Compliance tests ensure compatibility across versions

But Toyota’s Rx-OSEK850 version is non-standard!!!

! Was not certified as OSEK compliant
! Certified products for V850 were available by 2002

Barr Chapter Regarding

28 Toyota’s Operating Systems
TOYOTA FAILED TO COMPLY WITH STANDARDS
Automotive Industry Coding Guidelines

MISRA-C – motor industry software reliability coding rules for C

! By 2004, “the successes and global use of MISRA-C across automotive,
aerospace, medical, and other industries has been staggering.”
! “In Japan, we have worked with representatives of JSAE, JAMA, …”

From 2002-2004, Toyota said in public they followed MISRA-C

! But NASA reported > 7,000 violations of some of the rules (p. 29)
! I checked the full set and found > 80,000 in violations in 2005 Camry L4

Toyota’s coding standard only has 11 MISRA-C rules

! And 5 of those are violated in the actual source code
Barr Chapter Regarding
29 Toyota’s MISRA-C Violations
 VIOLATING CODING RULES CAUSES BUGS

In the words of Toyota itself:

30 VANALFEN006972 (Kawana, 2004)

TOYOTA FAILED TO COMPLY WITH STANDARDS
Internal Coding Standards

Toyota maintains a set of company internal coding rules

! Specifically for “power train” ECM software developers to follow
Mr. Ishii’s statement about 50% MISRA-C overlap was found false
! NASA reported Toyota didn’t follow some of its rules (p. 22)
I found at least 32% of Toyota’s coding rules were violated

Enforcement is the most important part of having a rule

! Demonstrates lack of engineering discipline at Toyota
! Part of a larger pattern of inadequate software process/oversight
Inadequate and untracked peer code reviews
No bug-tracking system
Barr Chapter Regarding
31 Toyota’s Coding Standards
 TOYOTA ADMITS ETCS HAS SOFTWARE BUGS

A: When it comes to software, there are going to be

bugs, and [that] is the case not just with Toyota but
with [any] software in the automotive industry and any
software. So the issue is not whether or not there is a
bug but rather is the bug an important material bug.
– Ishii 5/24/12 Deposition, p. 91

Indeed there are bugs, including “important material bugs”

Barr Chapter Regarding

32 Toyota’s Software Bugs
 NASA’S SOFTWARE AREAS OF CONCERN

NASA, Appendix B, pp. 36-39

= Defects Found by Barr Group

Barr Chapter Regarding

33 Task Death and UA
 TOYOTA’S DEFECTIVE “SAFETY LAYERS”

Barr Chapter Regarding

Layer 1 Mirroring of Critical Variables Toyota’s Memory Protections

Barr Chapter Regarding

Layer 2 DTCs and Fail-Safe Modes Toyota’s Fail-Safe Modes

Layer 3 Barr Chapter Regarding

Watchdog Supervisor
Toyota’s Watchdog Supervisor

Barr Chapter Regarding

Layer 4 ESP-B2 Monitor CPU
Toyota’s Monitor CPU

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LAYER 1: MIRRORING OF CRITICAL VARIABLES

Toyota’s engineers sought to protect numerous variables

against software- and hardware-caused corruptions
! e.g., by “mirroring” their contents in a 2nd location

But FAILED TO MIRROR several key critical variables

! OSEK’s critical internal data structures
! THE target throttle angle global variable!
Commands a part of the software to open the throttle
Ø  Recalculated every 8 ms (when the tasks are all alive)
Corruption is indistinguishable from a driver gas pedal press!

Barr Chapter Regarding

35 Toyota’s Memory Protections
 THROTTLE COMMAND DESIGN

throttle read
Motor
write
Task X command Control
(e.g. 20%) Task

Barr Chapter Regarding

36 Toyota’s Software Architecture
 UA VIA MEMORY CORRUPTION

Task X death causes loss of throttle control by driver

! Changes at the accelerator pedal have no effect on throttle angle
! Cruise control switches have no effect

Motor Control Task continues to drive throttle motor; engine powered

! Throttle could stick at last computed throttle command, or
! Change angle via corruption of throttle command global variable

One corruption event can cause task death and open throttle
! Memory corruptions are like ricocheting bullets

Barr Chapter Regarding

37 Task Death and UA
 TOYOTA’S DEFECTIVE THROTTLE CONTROL

Memory Corruption
Death not Detected

unmirrored read Motor

dead Control
command
Task X Task
(e.g. 50%)

“Fail-Safes” Monitoring This Portion Only

(no knowledge of driver’s actual intent)

Barr Chapter Regarding

38 Toyota’s Software Bugs
 LAYER 2: DTCs AND FAIL-SAFE MODES

NASA talks about 5 fail-safe modes (pp. 79-83)

! Limp home modes 1-3 (degrees of gas pedal sensor mistrust)
! Idle mode fuel cut (2,500 rpm limit at idle)
! Engine off (via several different “class 2” failures)

However, all 5 fail-safes are in same Task X

! Throttle control and fail-safes in same fault containment region
Unreasonable design; alternative structures well-known

Most diagnostic trouble codes need Task X too!

Barr Chapter Regarding
39 Toyota’s Fail Safe Modes
 LAYER 3: WATCHDOG SUPERVISOR

A “watchdog timer” is hardware to auto-reset software

! Healthy software should periodically “check-in” to prevent reset

With multiple tasks, health of all tasks must be checked

Barr Chapter Regarding
40 Toyota’s Watchdog Supervisor
 TOYOTA’S DEFECTIVE WATCHDOG DESIGN

Toyota’s watchdog supervisor design is unreasonable

! Incapable, ever, of detecting death of majority of tasks
! Incapable of properly and reliably detecting CPU overload
! Allows vehicle misbehavior due to overloads lasting up to 1.5s
! Resets the watchdog timer hardware in a timer tick ISR
! Explicitly ignores and discards most operating system error codes
Ignoring error codes violates a MISRA-C rule (1998: #86; 2004: #16.10)

Reasonable design alternatives were well known

! Indeed the primary purpose should’ve been to detect task death
! 2005 Prius (HV-ECU) watchdog is better
Barr Chapter Regarding
41 Toyota’s Watchdog Supervisor
 LAYER 4: ESP-B2 MONITOR CPU

“System Guards”
! All (3) useless after Task X death (don’t know driver intent)

“Brake Echo Check”

! Depends on the driver to take action—after UA has already begun!
Sometimes a counter-intuitive/dangerous action
Ø  Clearly this is not a “designed” fail-safe for UA or task death
! Takes the wrong actions (should’ve reset ECM not stalled car)
! Not 100% reliable

Does not detect all main CPU malfunctions

Barr Chapter Regarding
42 Toyota’s Monitor CPU
 TOYOTA FAILED TO REVIEW MONITOR CPU

A: With respect to [the monitor CPU], the development

process is completely different. When it comes to the
source code that would be embedded in [the monitor
CPUs] we, Toyota, don’t receive them. … there would
not be a design review done on the software.
Q: Now, the monitoring software for the electronic
throttle control system is in the [] ESP-B2 chip; correct?
A: Yes.
- Ishii 5/24/12 Deposition, pp. 36-37

Barr Chapter Regarding

43 Toyota’s Monitor CPU
 AGAIN: FAILED TO REVIEW MONITOR CPU!

The critical “monitor CPU” that checks the main CPU

has never been independently reviewed
! Toyota doesn’t even have a copy of the source code
! NASA didn’t review that critical system component either
!?
ESP-B2 source code was not provided to NASA

Barr Group has reviewed Denso’s ESP-B2 source code

! Monitor CPU for 2005-2009 Camry L4 (and some other models)

Barr Chapter Regarding

44 Toyota’s Monitor CPU
 MONITOR CPU IS LAST LINE OF UA DEFENSE

But ESP-B2 monitor CPU could have included a proper UA defense:

! IF (driver is braking & throttle is not closing) THEN reset ECM
Something is not right with the main CPU when that happens!
Resets of main CPU barely noticeable at speed (brief rpm drop)
! CRITICAL to ending UA in vehicles with potential vacuum loss

Per car cost to add this safety feature is $0.00 (it’s just bits)
! There was enough memory and CPU bandwidth for these instructions
! All of the required electrical inputs and outputs were already present
! In line with E-Gas Level 3 recommendations

Barr Chapter Regarding

45 Toyota’s Monitor CPU
 TOYOTA’S DEFECTIVE SOFTWARE PROCESS

FMEA was incomplete; single points of failure are present

! Because: Toyota didn’t adopt a formal safety process
Peer reviews not done on OS code and ESP-B2 code
! Because: Toyota didn’t perform code reviews; used non-standard OSEK
Toyota’s own “power train” coding standard not enforced
! Because: Toyota didn’t follow through with software suppliers

Watchdog supervisor doesn’t detect most task’s deaths

! Generally costs less to push the limits than upgrade to faster CPU
No EDAC protection against hardware bit flips
! Generally costs less to make memory chips without EDAC
If confident, why let NASA believe there was EDAC?
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 TOYOTA’S INADEQUATE SOFTWARE PROCESS

Ø  Toyota failed to exercise a safe

standard of care for software
Ø  Relied too much on vendors
Ø  Lacked internal expertise
Ø  Inadequate supervision and
training of software

Barr Chapter Regarding

47 Toyota’s Code Complexity
 TOYOTA’S DEFECTIVE SAFETY CULTURE

48 TOY-MDL016058888P-0001
 NASA SOUGHT WHAT BARR GROUP FOUND

NASA p. 78
“Single memory corruption results in UA”
“Fault escapes detection”
! “No EDAC error” (because there is no EDAC!)
! “Idle fuel cut not active” (because in same task)
! “Watchdog serviced” (because defective design)
! Monitor-CPU “does not detect failure” (because not designed to)
“Openings up to wide open throttle”

49 Barr St. John Report

 UNREASONABLE SINGLE POINTS OF FAILURE

Safety critical systems shouldn’t have single points of failure

! This is the normal mode of design in automotive industry

Toyota tried to mitigate such risks, including in software

! But missed some dangerous single points of failure
Failed to prevent or contain faults …
! There are single points of failure in the ETCS
Some demonstrated in 2005 and 2008 Camry L4 vehicles
Unpredictable range of vehicle misbehaviors via task death
Other memory corruptions can be expected

50 Barr St. John Report

 INDIVIDUAL TASK DEATH OUTCOMES
(Watchdog should have detected them all!)
Task Death Response (Fail-Safe) Task Death Response (Fail-Safe)

task ECM Reset (watchdog) spark on cyl. 4 Not Detected

wheel speed Not Detected spark off cyl. 4 Not Detected

crank speed Not Detected fuel injection stall (mechanical)

engine speed Not Detected task Not Detected

task stall (comm. Check) 30° med stall (mechanical)

motor control if accel change stall (sys guards) Task X if brake change cut-stall (echo)

spark on cyl. 1 Not Detected duty solenoid Not Detected

spark off cyl. 1 Not Detected task if accel change cut (echo)

spark on cyl. 2 Not Detected task if brake change cut (echo)

spark off cyl. 2 Not Detected task stall (immobilizer)

spark on cyl. 3 Not Detected 30° low Not Detected

spark
51 off cyl. 3 Not Detected task Not Detected
Sources: Arora and Loudon Vehicle Testing; source code analysis. Legend: “Not Detected” means in at least one vehicle test.
 THE TEST SPACE IS EFFECTIVELY INFINITE

There are >16 million combinations of task death

! Memory corruption can kill 1, 2, or all 24

Each task can die in thousands of different states

! Vehicle operational states (e.g., cruise on/off; accel 5% vs. 50%)
And what happens next; driver reactions to misbehaviors; etc.
! Internal software states TOO MANY
POSSIBLE
OPERATIONAL
TESTS
SCENARIOS
E
UR
Test “samples” so far confirm I L
FA P E
TY
S

! Claimed fail-safes inadequate! TIMING AND SEQUENCING

Barr Chapter Regarding

52 Task Death and UA
 UA FOREVER IF BRAKE ON AT TASK DEATH
Vehicle
speed is
~ 45 mph

Gas pedal
does not
Fail-safe
affect
acts only
speed any
after
more!
driver
removes
foot
Brake on (fully)
(even None of the from
lightly) at “fail-safes” act brake
start of > 30 seconds
task
death

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Source: Loudon St. John Report
 CASE-SPECIFIC OPINIONS

ETCS misbehavior is more likely than other causes

! Car should have stopped in less distance if throttle not open (McCort)
! Eyewitness testimony of alert driver using brakes (Mrs. Schwarz)
! No evidence of pedal entrapment by a floor mat (photos)
! No mechanical problems found at any vehicle inspection (experts)

Cannot identify with 100% certainty the specific software defects

! Toyota’s software design “deletes” evidence of software problems
Restart car and engine is fine (Toyota should have logged errors)

More likely than not undetected Task X death

! Many brake pumpers don’t fully release the brake pedal (Cooper)
! “Car sped up when brakes were pumped” makes sense

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 OTHER SIMILAR INCIDENT CRITERIA

Vehicles with substantially similar ETCS software

! e.g., 2005-2009 Camry

Incidents with no apparent mechanical cause

! Lack of support for floor mats trapping accelerator pedal
! No indication of any mechanical issue before or after

Driver and witness statements describe UA

! And no evidence contradicting correct use of pedals

OSI Sources: NHTSA complaint database, Toyota FTRs, claims

55 Barr St. John Report

 TOYOTA’S EXPERT’S EVOLVING STATEMENTS

ETCS contains “layers of protection” (Jul 2012)

! True, but misses the key point: there are gaps thru those layers

Brake echo is a “designed fail-safe” (Sep 2012-Aug 2013)

! No, IF it were “by design” the fail-safe
would NOT require the driver to act before the fail-safe!
would NEVER require removal of foot from brake pedal
Ø  counter-intuitive (in an emergency!) and likely to increase (!) risk of harm
would NOT stall the engine (given ECM reset is correct & safer)

“It depends on how much fuel” (Sep 2013)

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 TOYOTA’S EXPERT HAS NOT REBUTTED

My Operating System opinions/chapter

My Software Bugs opinions/chapter
My Memory Protections opinions/chapter
My Software Architecture opinions/chapter
My Watchdog Supervisor opinions/chapter
My Fail-Safe Modes opinions/chapter
My MISRA-C Violation opinions/chapter
My Coding Standard opinions/chapter
My Code Complexity opinions/chapter
My Stack Analysis opinions/chapter

Most of Dr. Koopman’s opinions/report

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