ChargeX: Exploring State and Rate Attacks in Electric Vehicle Charging Systems

Researchers discovered that the SAE J1772 charging control protocol, which manages communication between electric vehicle chargers and cars, lacks proper authentication (verification that devices are who they claim to be). They created ChargeX, a hardware attack that modifies charging control signals to disrupt charging schedules, cause denial of service (DoS, making systems unavailable), or damage batteries. Tests on Tesla chargers and home chargers showed the attacks can force unwanted charging states or crash chargers into error states.