New services for networked, automated, and autonomous electromobility: the aim of the “iKoPA” project is to make autonomous driving and parking even better and more compliant with data protection requirements.

We’re about to pull off: the driver gets into her networked electric car and uses a smartphone app to select a free charging spot in a parking garage at her destination. The car then receives information about available spots. During the journey, the car is already communicating with the traffic lights en route. Its speed is automatically adjusted to ensure that all intersections have a green light. This saves the time and energy that would be wasted by braking to a stop and pulling off again.

Once our driver arrives at the parking garage, the car communicates with the barrier at the entrance using vehicle-to-X communication. The pseudonymized ID authentication guarantees that data protection provisions are complied with. The barrier opens and the car is autonomously driven to the reserved space. Just before reaching the space, the vehicle communicates with the charging station to initiate charging. The driver can keep track of the charging progress at any time using her smartphone. If she needs her car, she can use a secure connection to tell it to meet her at the entrance to the parking garage.

One focus of the project is on securing users’ privacy. Existing and newly developed communication concepts are being merged with mechanisms for pseudonymization. Integration of the traffic infrastructure allows for new and optimized driving, parking, and charging functions with a high degree of or even complete automation.

About “iKoPA”

iKoPA was funded by Germany’s Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).  The following partners were involved:

• Bayerische Medien Technik (bmt) GmbH

• Fraunhofer FOKUS

• Fraunhofer SIT

• Daimler Center for Automotive Information Technology Innovations (DCAITI) at TU Berlin

• University of Applied Sciences in Saarbrücken (htw saar)

• NXP Semiconductors Germany GmbH

• SWARCO Traffic Systems GmbH

• Unabhängiges Landeszentrum für Datenschutz Schleswig-Holstein (Independent State Center for Data Protection in Schleswig-Holstein) (ULD)