FindAWay

I don't think that statement is a belief held by very many....but, it reminds me of some folks' mythical negative opinions about WN, which is epitomized by posts like this one:

ysolde

Slightly OT, but growing up, my mother and another mom at school had the exact same car. Exactly the same. Same model, same year, same color, same interiors, same details, same everything. It was weird. Occasionally, either she or my mother could be found in the school parking lot (or, more hilariously, in the shopping mall parking lot) desperately trying to open the other's car with their car key and wondering aloud, "Why can't I open my car?" When the @:-) would go off over their heads (you could almost see it) and they would say, "It's not my car, is it?" and they would slink off, embarrassed, to look for their own vehicle. Talk about first world problems . . .

SpannerSpinner

Regardless of the number of physical key patterns in modern lock, with pretty much every car made now using transponder keys there is almost zero chance of starting a car, even the base model rental Yaris' (Yarii?) have transponder keys.

tentseller

The physical pattern is limited by the mechanism. The chip in the key pattern possibilities are quite a bit higher.

Efrem

There is, however, a method that works with remotes that use rolling patterns. It's not easy, it requires some specialized equipment, but it's been demonstrated. With most cars now on the road, it is not stoppable.

Greatly simplified, suppose the key sends (and the lock expects) patterns in the sequence A, B, C, D and so on. Your device waits for someone to try to open the car. Say the key sends C. The device stores C and jams the signal, so the door never gets that signal and doesn't unlock. Since we're all used to car doors sometimes not unlocking when we press the button, the driver thinks nothing of it and presses again. The key sends D. The device intercepts D, jams it, stores it, and (in less than a second) sends out the stored pattern C (which the lock never received before, so that's what the lock expects now). The door opens. The driver gets in and drives away. The device has a stored key, D, to use any time its owner wants to get into this car. If the driver wants to unlock the car again, the key will send E, the device will jam and store E, and will then unlock the door with D. It always has the next pattern in the sequence, ready to go. This doesn't depend on any knowledge of how the key generates patterns.

Such a device can easily be hidden under a car, attached by magnets, and controlled by radio whenever its owner is nearby - as he or she would have to be if unlocking the car is to be of any use.

MrTemporal

My favorite myth is that by flying some convoluted route, with many stops and a forced extra hotel stay, I am saving $89 a ticket. Given the cost of the extra room, meals, and the lost vacation day I figure that a non-stop or one-stop direct route is far cheaper.

Example, I flew Economy Plus to and from Europe for $1400 recently. I could have paid 'only' $1150 for flights that involved two extra stops and 16 hours of extra travel time. This is a deal???

MrTemporal

IIRC, Washington has the highest liquor taxes of any state in the Union.

shuigao

To a minimum wage student earning $5 an hour at McDonalds, it totally is a deal

SpannerSpinner

Negative. You've managed to beat the remote door lock/unlock system and unlock the doors, but now you need to start the car, as soon as you insert a key (or screwdriver etc) into the ignition barrel the cars immobilser system sends a code to the chip on the key via the coil of wire around the key barrel and expects a certain encrypted response, when it fails to receive the correct response the engine will not start. They are seperate systems, and the two-way communication means challenge/response transponder systems on modern cars are not vunerable to code interception attacks like the attack described above.

KRSW

You're doing it wrong. Ironically, some of the most dull industries (Accounting, Finance) have produced some of the greatest expense'd entertainment I've been to.

You beat me to it.

What you said was true...about 10 years ago. Now with keyless ignition that's no longer the case: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/09...ar_theft_hack/

GRALISTAIR

+1

MrTemporal

Very true! If one has more time than money, go for it!!

darthbimmer

Here's an amusing one I ran into with a distant relative recently:

"I worked for AA my entire life until I retired several years ago so I know how the industry works! How can you think the answer you got from some chatroom is right and I am wrong?"

Note: some chatroom referred to FlyerTalk.

SpannerSpinner

They are cloning key fobs, or teaching the security system new keyfobs, not starting the car without a valid keyfob. The silly engineers that linked easily intercepted door lock/unlock code to the ignition enable system need a kick in the knackers, although the demand probably came from marketing. All in the name of lazy drivers that find putting a key in a slot and turning it to be too hard/uncool. Smh.

MaxBuck

The likelihood of somebody pulling this crap on my car is sufficiently low that the convenience of always leaving my key in my pocket is worth it.

SMH.