Thief Uses Mystery Electronic Device To Break Into Car

[Monroe]

So much for security ... I thought this was already happening with new car breakins ... maybe not. Sounds pretty easy to unlock a newer car, like hotel/motel rooms a few years back.

 

From the article:

 

"The device, which can reportedly be purchased online for as little as $5, appears to send an electromagnetic pulse to unlock vehicles."

 

 

Caught On Camera: Concord Thief Uses Mystery Electronic Device To Break Into Car

 

August 25, 2014

 

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2014/08/25/caught-on-camera-concord-thief-uses-mystery-electronic-device-to-break-into-car/

 

CONCORD (CBS SF) – Thieves are dispensing with the usual smash-and-grab technique and using a high-tech means to break into cars to steal items inside.

 

Surveillance video taken overnight outside a Concord home driveway shows a thief opening a locked car without a key, using a handheld electronic device to get in.

 

The thief is seen rifling through the inside of the car and then leaving without a trace – or sound.

 

“They are using some sort of device to unlock the door,” said auto theft police investigator J.D. Hough.

 

The device appears to have some type of key fob like the ones we use to open and lock cars. They will walk up to random cars, push a button, and see which car doors respond.

 

The device, which can reportedly be purchased online for as little as $5, appears to send an electromagnetic pulse to unlock vehicles.

 

“It seems like every time we invent something better to prevent criminal activity, the criminals are out there doing the same thing on how to defeat it,” said Hough.

 

The man in the Concord surveillance video is Caucasian, long hair in a ponytail, and wearing a backpack.

 

Concord Police said there have not been a lot of these cases in the city, but there has been a nationwide alert issued and car manufacturers are aware of the technology and recommend, for the meantime, not to leave valuables inside your car.

...

[DosProbie]

More Info on thieves going hi-tech

~DP

http://news.ca.msn.com/top-stories/new-dollar5-device-easily-unlocks-car-doors-for-thieves-in-winnipeg
$5 EMP generator technique ==> https://www.google.com/patents/US4873897

[jaclaz]

$5 EMP generator technique ==> https://www.google.com/patents/US4873897

Very little E, nothing M, and NO P, though.

 

The device is a continuous metallic rod bent at precise angles and at precise lengths so as to take advantage of the spaces in between the window and the outer shell, the hole within the inner shell, and the distance between the hole and the inner shell and the locking device.

 

 

The device selling for US$ 5 is too similar to an urban legend to not be an urban legend, at first sight.

 

However, as often happens, California came first :

http://abcnews.go.com/US/video/car-thieves-tech-gadgets-baffle-police-18891078

 

It makes a lot more sense:

http://jalopnik.com/whats-the-secret-device-thieves-in-california-are-using-471782175

that it is a sort of "RF brute forcing", and not a EMP device:

http://hackaday.com/2013/06/09/ask-hackaday-can-you-steal-a-car-with-a-mini-tesla-coil/

 

Of course it is impossible to reproduce a signal like the original car remote: 

http://www.today.com/news/police-admit-theyre-stumped-mystery-car-thefts-6C10169993

 

Long Beach Deputy Police Chief David Hendricks is mystified. "This is bad in the sense we're stumped," he told us. "We are stumped and we don't know what this technology is."

He said it's almost like the thieves are cloning your car remote, which is virtually impossible to do. Here's why: On most cars, when you hit the unlock button, it sends a code to the car. That code is encrypted and constantly changing — and should be hackproof.

Jim Stickley is one of the country's leading security experts. He's watched the tapes, and he's stumped too.

"This is really frustrating because clearly they've figured out something that looks really simple and whatever it is they're doing, it takes just seconds to do," Stickley said. "And you look and you go, 'That should not be possible.'"

 

 

Or maybe not

https://eprint.iacr.org/2010/332.pdf

http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2285482/luxury-car-hacking-findings-blocked-by-high-court

http://www.cs.ru.nl/~flaviog/publications/Gone_in_360_Seconds_Hijacking_with_Hitag2-USENIX_2012.pdf

 

 

jaclaz

[ZortMcGort11]

Magnavolt!