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A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

mrooding.me

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Re: A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

#271

Post by Scoundreller »

mrooding wrote: post #228

Hi guys, very cool to see how this is being picked up over here. Shame on me, but I actually forgot to submit it to Hacker News. The key fob method is out of the question for my car. I've known about it for a while and store my keys in special bags. I see quite a few people asking why a sting wasn't organised. I of course shared the M.O. with the police and we actually had a few phone calls from them over the past fe…

Oh, and get a dashcam with parking mode!

Front and rear. Maybe the sides too?

They’re increasingly inexpensive, and you can move them car to car as you buy/sell.

I originally bought a forward facing, and as i’ve upgraded, my old forward facing is now my rear facing.

Re: A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

#272

Post by Tobba_ »

inferiorhuman wrote: post #268
Rjevski wrote: post #101

I used to fix cars for a living. Sometimes it involved “cracking” alarm & immobiliser systems. My clients all claimed they broke/lost their keys to their car - most of the time they were believable (car stuck in front of their driveway, etc). Sometimes less so, but I’d do it anyway because I needed the money and I had no proof of the contrary (innocent until proven guilty right?), although given the sad conditions of…

> There is very little cryptography involved Wha? That may have been true about twenty years ago, but not now. BMW was using 256-bit RSA keys to validate ECU firmware and authenticate privileged access in the early 2000s (they're up to 1024-bit keys now) and write-once memory in their instrument clusters for about as long. Other (Euro) car makers using the same vendors offer similar features. Once you have physical a…

Why the hell does RSA ever get used anymore, esp. in smartcards etc? It's been obsolete for like 10 years thanks to ECC, and ECC is way easier to implement (esp. 127-bit and 521-bit).

Re: A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

#273

Post by rocqua »

Tobba_ wrote: post #272
inferiorhuman wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is very little cryptography involved Wha? That may have been true about twenty years ago, but not now. BMW was using 256-bit RSA keys to validate ECU firmware and authenticate privileged access in the early 2000s (they're up to 1024-bit keys now) and write-once memory in their instrument clusters for about as long. Other (Euro) car makers using the same vendors offer similar features. Once you have physical a…

Why the hell does RSA ever get used anymore, esp. in smartcards etc? It's been obsolete for like 10 years thanks to ECC, and ECC is way easier to implement (esp. 127-bit and 521-bit).

RSA has value in encryption which ECC can't do.

Beyond that, RSA is so much easier to understand and implement. Because computing powers of numbers is easier than computing multiples of points on a curve.

Re: A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

#274

Post by DenTheRed »

voidmain0001 wrote: post #171
acct1771 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stripping or modding a Tesla would be the only way I'd get one...and I'd really like to. Very interested in what happens in this thread.

A Motherboard article appeared on HN about a rogue Tesla mechanic. Here is his channel to help you get started: https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCfV0_wbjG8KJADuZT2ct4SA#

That Tesla powered Audi RS5 is an amazing hack! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOYY_AlRWQA

Re: A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

#275

Post by ashildr »

PuffinBlue wrote: post #138
justin66 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a British tabloid.

A most damning indictment indeed.

That’s how you sell newspapers and clicks.

Im in Amsterdam quite often, it just a short drive from where I live in Germany, and it’s a safe and fun place to be, if you take into account that it’s very touristy. I’ve been watching the canal pride from a park this year and was amazed that people even actually cleaned up their mess. Very unlike than at home, unfortunately.

Re: A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

#276

Post by rciorba »

thedrbrian wrote: post #234
disiplus wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

no, there is no software that i know of where you can as a consumer make your i3 an i5 with just a software unlock, that you can get for like 10 eur. the difference on the base model mercedes c class between getting a less powerful engine and the one that is one level up is like 3.5-4k eur. that is a lot of money. if i could unlock the bigger engine with just 400 eur i would buy the base model. manufacturers don't wa…

It’s not just more power though. My car has two version 130hp and 155. For the 2 grand I got 25 more horsepower and bigger brakes ,bigger clutch , bigger wheels with wider tyres and an LSD. The only time I can recall where the engine has been exactly the same inside was the mini one and Mini Cooper where the ecu only allowed for 86% throttle on the lower powered version. Every other engine has had a mechanical differ…

Mazda's 2.0 Gasoline Skyactiv is sold as both 120 and 165 HP. Same engine, same brakes, same clutch, different ecu mapping. The only mechanical difference is the gear box's final drive ratio (the 120's has longer gears for better fuel economy). Why would they do this? I assume economy of scale makes it cheaper.

Re: A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

#278

Post by TeMPOraL »

jdietrich wrote: post #210
TeMPOraL wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> imagine a CPU where 6 and 8 core variants are the same but the 6 core is locked in bios and you can unlock it with some tuning software, its like that. But isn't this already the case (except locking might be in CPU firmware)? AFAIR this is the case with GPUs.

It's not quite analogous: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_binning

The line between product binning and market segmentation is sometimes blurry.

Re: A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

#279

Post by jacquesm »

avar wrote: post #27

Reading this article is honestly a bit of a domestic culture shock for me, where does this guy live in The Netherlands? Here in downtown Amsterdam we called the police because the rear window of someone's car had just been smashed outside our office, and the police's response was "Has anyone been hurt? Nope? Then we're not coming". Meanwhile, wherever this guy lives they're sending officers because some BMW call cent…

I had a camper stolen from in front of my house in about 30 minutes. The police never even bothered to show up and only put an alert out a good 5 hours after the theft, by which time I suspect it was either out of the country or parts in some chop shop's bins. Highly annoying. For all the cameras and tracking going on it is surprisingly ineffective to actually do something about a crime.

Re: A Dutch first: Ingenious BMW theft attempt

#280

Post by bostik »

giobox wrote: post #16

I've anecdotally heard a lot of stories about the relay/replay attacks on keyless ignition systems used in many BMW models and other cars as well. No need to smash the window at all in some cases. Remarkably simple attack in principle, and probably a nightmare to explain to your insurer given there will be no evidence of a break in. Makes you wonder if you should start storing the key in a metal/RF shielded box at ho…

A personal anecdote from this side of the table.

Back in early 201x I was asked to take a look at a certain car manufacturer's project proposal. They wanted to introduce keyless unlock and ignition to their line.

I got the spec and the proposal. There was no security - the number of possible signalling combinations was in low thousands and the system was completely open to trivial replay attacks. So I got back and laid out my concerns and requirements: unique keys per car, strong nonce and proper cryptographic setup to make replay attacks impossible. The manufacturer balked, claimed it was too expensive and we lost the project.

Less than a year later certain mr. Miller demonstrated the very same type of key-fob replay attack against a different manufacturer.

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