The Isle of Wight council have apologised to anyone who might have seen “inappropriate Web content” on the screens of electric vehicle charging points after they were hacked to display a porn Website.
A council officer will be visiting the EV signage today (Wednesday) and tomorrow to ensure the third party Web sites are covered up on all four of their charging points.
IWC: Until now had not been an issue
The situation came to the council’s attention this week after their charge points, part of the GeniePoint network, were hacked to show the pornographic Websites. The screens are supposed to display the council’s Website, but a spokesperson for the council explained,
“The chargepoints were originally part of the Chargepoint Genie network, but ownership was transferred and they became part of the GeniePoint network. The displayed Web address had a redirect to the new Website, so until now had not been an issue.
“The council Website has the new geniepoint.co.uk link – see Electric vehicle charge points – Service Details (iow.gov.uk) and is up-to-date.”
Out of service chargepoints
Concerns had also been raised by residents about the unavailability of the Cross Street car park chargepoint. The council spokesperson said,
“The Cross Street, Newport, chargepoint was showing as ‘Available’ (meaning it is operational) on zap-map.com yesterday and this morning. Chargepoints can be out of service for a short period of time before being remotely rebooted, so this could be the issue with it not working,
“We are aware of the unreliability of some of the chargepoints in council car parks and will be replacing these with new chargepoints over the next few months.”
Isle of Wight council has electric vehicle chargepoints in Chapel Street Newport, Cross Street Cowes, Quay Road Ryde and Moa Place Freshwater.
Source: BBC Hampshire and Isle of Wight
