Dealing with the risk of keyless entry car theft
Within the UK keyless entry car theft has become a real problem. With many people suffering the loss of their vehicles during the night. With no break-ins to property or keys being fished through letterboxes.
In a nutshell, they are using totally legal devices that can be purchased cheaply on the internet called SDR's or software defined radio's. with a little programming, these devices can be set to sniff for certain signals like your keyless entry code. Once they have this they can then use the device to mimic the signal so that entry and ultimately start the vehicle so they can drive off into the night, not cool!
What can we do to avoid keyless entry car theft
- move the key away from the outer perimeter of the location. This isn't foolproof and you have no real way to test its effectiveness. but the idea behind it is, as the keys only have a short transmitting range if it's far enough of the perimeter of your house. the criminals sniffing codes shouldn't be able to pick it with their device and make off with your vehicle.
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turn off the keyless entry feature on the key/vehicle. not all makes/models allow for this but if it does it can be a foolproof way to stop this from happening as the feature is disabled.
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Using a signal blocking container to store the key in when not in use, if the signal is blocked then they cannot pick it up with the sniffing device.
DIY signal blockers
As always I thought I could make one my self and save a big of money, so out can the tinfoil and metal can and lots of fiddling to try and arrange it in a way that would block the signal. after extensive testing, I couldn't achieve a consistent block of the signal so the project was shelved under "utter waste of time"
so, in a nutshell, I wouldn't waste your time and money and potentially take a risk on the security of your vehicle by trying to save a little cash.
Products available to purchase
What I ended up doing was buying a cheap little signal blocking pouch not expecting much as a lot of things are sold with lots of hype and little function. I headed over to Amazon and typed in signal blocking pouch and looked for the ones that had the highest reviews. Once I settled on one in my price range and seemed to have good reviews on its ability to block signals hit the button to buy it.
what I found is that the pouch has to be sealed well or else it doesn't work.
So that's my plan in place keep the key away from the external walls of the house and store it in one of these pouches when it's not in use.
Thankfully my vehicle isn't one of those flashy high-value items the criminals tend to go for but, I'd rather play it safe.
one other thing that this could be used for is to store wireless bank/credit cards in to stop the possibility of someone skimming your card for lower amounts as the often have enough space in them to take a few cards also.
This issue has been reported to happen on trains and in shopping centers where when it's busy, it wouldn't seem out of place for someone to be standing close to you.
Anyway if you have a keyless entry car and are proactive in protecting your self and your assets check those pouches out super cheap and effective.
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D.
Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://electronicgarden.co.uk/2019/03/18/keyless-entry-car-theft-avoidance/