Patent ID: 8665700

Claim:
A method of detecting and mitigating an unintended active state of an in-vehicle communication network, the in-vehicle communication network including a plurality of electronic control units (ECUs) communicating over a controller area network bus system, each ECU includes both transmitting and receiving capabilities, and is configured with a communication protocol that provides guidelines for exchanging messages with other ECUs within the communication system, each ECU entering a communication kernel active state for communicating on the bus, the method comprising the steps of: (a) identifying virtual networks within the communication system, each virtual network including a collection of signals involving respective ECUs whose transmission and reception are started and stopped collectively as a unit; (b) detecting an active virtual network; (c) determining that the virtual network is not a network-activated virtual network; (d) determining that the active virtual network is not activated by a local ECU; (e) determining that the active virtual network is not activated by a local application; (f) identifying that the active virtual network is active by fault in response to each of the determinations in steps (c), (d), and (e); and (g) deactivating the faulty active virtual network.