Technology

Looking at the numbers in Canada, the Conservative party would make us believe that car theft is at a level never seen before but the truth is there were proportionally more cars stolen back in the 70s, 80, 90s and sometimes even more cars stolen than now in actual numbers with less cars on the road.

I know it's gonna sound completely crazy but... Maybe it's going up because the economic conditions at the moment make some people desperate and no matter if cars were keyless or not, the same thing would have happened? 🤔

It's always been vulnerable, but dismissed because common criminals didn't have access to required tools and the technical know-how to defeat common keyless entries. But things has changed and many entities start selling tools on the cheap to defeat keyless system such as flipper zero flashed with honda rf capture, etc.

In Canada, car theft was a major problem before 2010 until engine immobilizers became mandatory since 2007 on all vehicles made in Canada

Then everyone got too comfortable. The regulatory bodies and car manufacturers were too focused pretending doing some work and publishing all the buzzword-of-the-day "accomplishments" they were doing while patting each others backs without explicitely requiring manufacturers to comply/implement immediately anything. Meanwhile, manufacturers were happy to integrate almost off-the-shelf "children's RC" car starter pack obfuscated through invisible/non-existent security and protected under dubious industrial secrets.

Obviously, criminals smelled the easy money. Starting around 2013 — mystery car unlocking device | 2015 — signal repeater car burglary, car thefts by relay attacks were known by automakers but ignored as one-offs, too technical, already dealt with by law enforcement to lets pretent it's not that big of a problem or leave it to the police. Meanwhile, insurance claim replacement vehicles are selling like hotcakes and it is "convenient" to ignore the problem.

The following years various reprogramming theft become known and finally CAN bus injection — new form of keyless car theft that works in under 2 minutes or in depth investigation by Dr. Ken Tindell, becomes so easy, so cheap and widely available that even kids uses them to gain Youtube/TikTok followers.

Car hacking was a becoming serious concern during the pandemic, but now it's simply ridiculous and as if current automaker included/provided anti-theft/GPS tracking were (un)knowingly made "defective".

Hence, everyone is playing catch up and blaming left and right on who is responsible for this in-slow-motion public safety disaster.

Brian Kingston, president and CEO of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers' Association, which includes Ford Motor Company of Canada, General Motors of Canada and Stellantis, said increasing the risk of prosecution is the most effective way to deter vehicle theft.

"And at the same time, providing more outbound inspection controls at the ports to prevent the flow of stolen vehicles to foreign markets by organized criminal organizations," he added.

New vehicle safety standards have been published (rushed?) recently. We will see if all the panic settles down like after 2007.

Moreover, the exponential prevalence of car theft also laid bare the incredibly poor and ineffective security at the various ports of Canada. Unsurprisingly, it has been a known constant devolution:

The devolution of port authorities in Canada has not been without debate over the past 70 years. This paper provides a brief introduction to the role of ports in Canada and then examines the history of port policy and devolution, concluding that past policies were considered to have failed due to their inability to respond to changing circumstances.

(A partial repost of my same reply for a similar thread about the Canadian Government rushing to look like they are doing something, please check my post history for the other thread)

They've known far longer than that....

When was the invention of the immobilizer again? Oh yeah: 1919 104 years ago. With keyless entry being 1981 43 years ago.

Yet theres still cars on the road, built long after those creations, that you can start with a usb cable... (and that's just for the physical shape, not any sort of data)

Could anyone with more knowledge confirm, but couldn't they just do what some car companies are doing and have a system by which you can just disable keyless entry when it's parked up at night?

If I'm at home and my car is parked up where the key could potentially be repeated then I just disable it by locking the car using the key and tapping on the door handle, which disables just tapping the door handle to unlock it again, and only the unlock button on the key works. As far as I understand it resolves this issue, unless I'm missing something?

Where's the evidence that this stuff is even happening at a high enough rate to even be noteworthy? It seems these articles come out every couple of years, always heavy on claims and light on facts, trying to drum up FUD based on almost nothing but chatter. Last time it was a single grainy night-time video of a couple cars in a driveway where you see the lights flash and theives open the car.

The article claims insurance rates are skyrocketing due to car theft, yet their own article from January they cite states that insurance rates have skyrocketed due to record high inflation.

The article claims police close these cases out in 24 hours which means they aren't even investigating the crimes to find out what happened. They also quote the police who stated that 'car crimes' are down 39% since 2010. Police aren't stating this is an issue.

They quote a couple manufacturers who have higher rates of stolen vehicles and all they state is that they take security seriously and are working on improvements. There's no admission or statement here that this is even occurring.

Finally the only remaining evidence is a paper written 12 years ago theorizing that this could be an issue. Hardly proof that it's currently occurring.

To me, it just sounds like people who've watched too many movies like Gone in 60 Seconds and don't understand technology very well who're screaming that the sky is falling.

Everything with more tech or smart isn't always better.

This is the best summary I could come up with:

A device disguised as a games console - known as an “emulator” - is being exploited by thieves to steal vehicles within 20 seconds by mimicking the electronic key.

Police facing a spate of keyless car thefts in many neighbourhoods are closing some cases in less than 24 hours even when CCTV footage is available.

Jaguar Land Rover announced a £10m investment last November to upgrade security for commonly stolen models for cars built between 2018 and 2022.

The Observer investigation reveals other vehicles with similar security loopholes, with Hyundai confirming this weekend it working “as a priority” to prevent an attack on its cars by criminals “using devices to illegally override smart key locking systems”.

An article by Stephen Mason, a barrister specialising in electronic evidence and communication interception, in Computer Law and Security Review in April 2012 warned keyless systems could be “successfully undermined” and unless manufacturers improve the design cars would be stolen without forced entry.

Mike Hawes, SMMT Chief Executive, said: “Car makers continuously introduce new technology to stay one step ahead of criminals.

The original article contains 623 words, the summary contains 178 words. Saved 71%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

Literally any vehicle not made with more than 4 week old tech is subject to theft, the people who write articles and pass laws don't understand anything but near as I can tell. I've worked on cars all my life, but I lost interest after my early 20s on keeping up. I can steal any vehicle built before 2000 in a few minutes, getting into seconds pre 94. The "kids today" who've worked on modern cars all their life can do this to anything new fast, it's the old junk that might slow them down.

Business bros didn’t care, you say?

5 years ago, a 70-year-old towtruck driver/mechanic told me how he learned of the tools criminals can use to steal keyless entry vehicles. Anyone worth half their salt in the industry knows it's possible and how it's done and has known for a while.