As the 2.6 tonne ute rounds a bend, he gets to work.
With the stroke of a key, he kills the headlights, plunging me into darkness.
The attack is not a total surprise. The Shark has spent the past two weeks with Dan Hreszczuk, a cybersecurity expert who specialises in cars.
His task was to hack the vehicle and find out what could be seen and done remotely by the Shark’s Chinese manufacturer.
“It was easier than we were expecting,” Hreszczuk says.
Modern connected cars, particularly EVs and hybrids, are increasingly run by software, giving manufacturers the power to change, update and control vehicles, like never before.
In the case of BYD and others, that software is controlled from China.
With fuel prices on the rise, EVs and plug-in hybrids like the Shark have gone mainstream this year, making up almost a third of new cars sales to date. More than half of these are from Chinese brands.
Source: ABC Australia