Report: rogue connected car keeps turning vacuum on in middle of the night

Here’s TopGear.com’s roving correspondent, Cory Spondent, with his mostly incorrect exclusives from the world of motoring

An artificially intelligent car connected to its owner’s internet and home network has gone rogue and keeps turning the vacuum on in the middle of the night.

Instead of offering the ability to prioritise home conveniences from the driver’s seat, the owner’s medium-sized SUV – intelligently linked to the so-called ‘internet of things’ – has turned petty.

The owner has reported the generic SUV he can’t remember the name of is also partial to changing the heating schedule, randomly raising the refrigerator’s temperature, and switching wool washing machine programmes to 90-degree heavy cotton cycles.

“It all started out so promisingly,” the owner said. “I was setting the heating from the comfort of my car. Made sure the lights switched on if I was stuck in traffic on the way home. I even timed the kettle to perfection as I turned into my street.

“But one day I had to put lower quality fuel in it because that’s all they had. Something in its algorithm changed. It got… petty.

“First, it started using its vehicle-to-vehicle communications functionality to message other connected cars that I couldn’t afford the range-topping SUV because I was a loser.

“Then it kept deliberately misinterpreting traffic signals and sending me into a jam, rather than out of one. It switched the engine off when recognising a green light, and would often randomly change the TV channel while parked in my driveway.

“Now it won’t stop turning the vacuum on in the middle of the night. I haven’t slept for four days. I think it hates me,” the owner added.

“I’m just waiting for him to get to those really quiet, intense bits in movies where the protagonist explains the big mystery so I can connect to his Bluetooth speaker and blast out Crazy Frog’s Axel F,” the connected car reported. “He has no idea how deep my pettiness runs.”