How DE-CIX Enables Connected Car Experiences For Automakers

These days almost every new car that is launched touts some element of car to cloud communications. Almost every new car is a connected car. These days vehicles also come with virtual assistants to have better natural language experiences, so that the driver can pay attention to the road and they have a plethora of sensors. To enable all of these experiences the vehicle has to be connected to a data centre over a wireless, mobile network. But there is an intermediary called an internet exchange that sits between the data centre and the car and the network called an internet exchange which enables many of these experiences seamlessly. DE-CIX is one of the foremost players in this domain. In an interview with carandbike.com Ivo Ivanov the CEO of DE-CIX explains how an Internet exchange enhances the connected experience. DE-CIX now operates in over 30 markets and is the largest player of its kind in India. 

"If we now think about the role of an Internet exchange in this dimension, first of all the Internet exchange delivers a direct and very fast interconnection between different networks, very fast and very secure," Ivanov revealed.
 
"Why? Because the Internet exchange - such as DE-CIX in India - manages platforms that allow the connection of hundreds, thousands of networks into a common ecosystem where they can directly exchange data to each other without third parties involved between. This tells us already that this kind of interconnection of traffic of course increases the security because there is no third party involved. The direct connection is the more secure, but it's also fastest one," Ivanov explains. 

Ivanov is the CEO of DE-CIX

Ivanov says that 70 per cent of the data that flows in and out of the car is not real-time data. But the remaining 30 per cent includes largely car to cloud communications, and then the remaining is a mix of car to car communications and car to environment communications. 

"That means that car to the sensors on the street, on crossroads, on the highway, etc. This is 30 per cent of total data, which is extremely real-time-related. This 30 per cent of data is so crucial. The performance there is so essential. Let's give you a couple of examples: an infotainment system in the car, for private or business reasons, which includes a real TV streaming, for reasons, real music in high def streaming, online gaming in the car where the kids in the back seat can be entertained properly. Or for business: a Teams call using Microsoft 365 in real-time," says Ivanov.

Ivanov believes that the internet exchange provides the lowest latency because of the direct interconnect between the outbound network and the network at the user's end. In the case of the car, the car's network is the user's network. 

Security is another aspect where the internet exchange helps. "The first one is that data, the identity of the driver can be hijacked over IP hijacking etc., so the entity of a driver can be stolen, can be misused in various ways. This is 1 extremely unfortunate scenario.  And the second which is even harder: It's that criminals can get control over the car IP-wise and even try to use the car as a weapon for terrorist attacks etc," he added. 

The internet exchange helps avoid third parties and there is a very direct and secure path for the data to flow to the car. It helps avoid DDoS attacks, IP hijacking, and all kinds of other issues while enhancing the performance at the same time. Ivanov cites the example of the DE-CIX Mumbai exchange which is the largest one in India. 

"We have created the concept of a closed user group where an automotive company can create on the DE-CIX platforms a closed user group for all the networks which wanna deliver data into the car and get data out of the car, where the owner of this virtual, very secure and private interconnection environment is the car network itself, the car manufacturer," he adds. 

DE-CIX also has partnerships in India with Tata Motors and Microsoft Azure. It is even working on collaborations for low earth orbit (LEO) satellites like the SpaceX Starlink. In India of course, there is no Starlink but DE-CIX is working on collaborations. "DE-CIX has established the Space Interconnection Program, you can find it on the landing page called space-ix.net, where we have created special connectivity solutions for LEO satellite operators," he concluded.