Keyless Cars Are Being Hacked Into Rather Easily

In a recent report to have emerged in Malaysia, it was revealed that car owners with keyless entry systems face the risk of loss of their vehicles to thieves who use frequency-hacking devices.

These car hackers are able to buy the devices online and use them to 'listen' to the emitted signals from car key dongles and steal the rolling code. Once the car key code has been identified by the frequency-hacking device, the car is unlocked. Since a car key is not required to start the engine, the car thief is able to make a quick getaway simply by pressing the Start-Stop ignition button.

Car theft syndicates are working with hackers to disable the RFID based lock mechanisms in 3 different ways currently:

1. A combination of the RFID hacking device and a computer running the frequency monitoring software downloaded from the Internet. The rolling code is decrypted by the software program and adopted by the remote key to unlock the car doors.

2. The RFID hacking device 'attacks' the car lock mechanism by sending a signal that mimics the car's remote and the car's system responds by sending a rolling code to the device. The device captures the code and adopts it into the device to unlock the car remotely.

3. A device captures the radio signal when the car's remote and the car's locking system communicate with each other. The radio signal is adopted by the hacking device and used in the theft by unlocking the doors.

All of the above methods may take only a few minutes. The larger the hackers' code database, the quicker the process of illicit unlocking of the car. Car thieves are also careful to disable the cars' alarms after they successfully unlock the doors as an added measure.

German based ADAC, has reported that 110 models from 27 different car manufacturers are especially prone to being compromised by car hackers. Unfortunately, a fool-proof system to avoid this mode of thefts is currently not available. In the meantime, car owners with these keyless systems can take interim measures to protect their vehicles by installing gear or steering wheel locks, immobilisers, motion sensors and GPS tracking systems to track their vehicles if they get stolen.

It's a shame that a modern, elegant and convenient car locking solution can be so easily compromised. It is highly likely that we may have to revert to the old way of protecting our cars with physical keys; since a technical solution for keyless systems will take some time to develop. Reports of car thefts using these RFID hacking devices are on the rise in many parts of the world. The best options today are to ditch the option for keyless systems or adopt additional physical measures to protect them.

Image Source: The Star/Asia News Network

Post references:

1. Straits Times
2. The Star