Published: · Region: Global · Category: cyber

Norway finds Chinese rental cars used in airport drill stored video of troop movements and gate codes

Norway’s Home Guard discovered that Chinese‑made rental cars used during a wartime defense exercise at Oslo Airport had an undisclosed recording function that stored footage of troop movements and security codes typed at military gates.

A Norwegian exercise to secure Oslo Airport in a war scenario has exposed an unexpected weakness: commercially rented, Chinese‑made cars that quietly recorded sensitive military activity.

According to reports from Norway, Home Guard crews used Chinese‑made rental vehicles during a drill to practice defending the capital’s main airport. After the exercise, they discovered that the cars had a built‑in recording function that had neither been requested nor disclosed.

Footage stored by the vehicles included images of troop movements and even the security codes soldiers entered at military gates. The video remained in the cars’ systems, but the fact that the data existed at all, without the military’s knowledge, raised immediate security concerns.

In practical terms, the recordings captured routes used by Home Guard units to approach and secure the airport, as well as keypad entries at controlled access points. For any state or actor able to access that data, such material would be a detailed guide to Norwegian defensive procedures around a critical transport hub.

The discovery illustrates how modern, networked vehicles can act as mobile cameras inside sensitive areas when their data‑logging features are not fully understood. It also underlines the security questions NATO countries face when relying on consumer products from manufacturers based in geopolitical rival states.

Norway now has to decide how to handle foreign‑made connected vehicles in future drills and deployments, and whether to restrict their use near key infrastructure. Other allies will be watching how Oslo responds, and examining their own exposure to similar risks in rented or civilian vehicles around bases and airports.

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