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A surprisingly simple way to foil car thieves

news.umich.edu

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Re: A surprisingly simple way to foil car thieves

#151

Post by kube-system »

EGreg wrote: post #101
gruez wrote: post #16

>At the end of the three-year project, the team aims to have a commercially viable prototype that can be scaled up to commercial production, first as a theft deterrent device, and potentially later as a complete vehicle entry and control system that could replace traditional keys and fobs. What's the point of this? Modern cars already have engines that are cryptographically tied to keys[1]. They're not perfect, but i…

So let me get this straight Modern cars have engines that are cryptographically ties to keys But the Pentagon couldn’t put biometric locks on their humvees? https://www.ibtimes.co.in/isis-takes-dozens-captured-us-humv... They can’t account for trillions of dollars… but we vote them more money they didn’t even ask for https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/11/us/politics/trump-budget.... ”Mr. Trump’s budget, the largest in f…

Locks are often intentionally omitted from equipment in environments where high availability is prioritized. They are also often omitted in locations where physical security is provided at a broader level.

Re: A surprisingly simple way to foil car thieves

#152

Post by K0balt »

StevenXC wrote: post #107
K0balt wrote: post #84

1.2 million grant for this? Now I’ve seen grift, but come on. I want to hire their grant writer. Literally a relay in the starter lead. This looks like one of my afternoon projects, and I’m not even joking. I have a 1990s montero diesel and it leaks power, and I often forget to disconnect the terminal. So I bought a relay from AliExpress (same one shown in this photo but one size up) and hooked it up with an esp32 an…

Speaking as someone who's reviewed for NSF before, I'd have expected this grant to also include resources to get the product to market, which I'm assuming you haven't done.

Not on the battery relay, no, but I have done some small scale hardware projects (>10k units) , and for something like this I’d need about 250k to make 10k units of a But they might be funding for marketing costs and other soft expenses. Nice project and a great jaunt for a year or two. I’m sure they will learn a lot. Good for them.

The real screwy thing here is it’s like they did no market research or customer testing here. There are already a multitude of cheap, sophisticated, highly effective solutions in this segment that are much less user hostile than this gadget seems to be .

Re: A surprisingly simple way to foil car thieves

#153

Post by woobar »

K0balt wrote: post #84

1.2 million grant for this? Now I’ve seen grift, but come on. I want to hire their grant writer. Literally a relay in the starter lead. This looks like one of my afternoon projects, and I’m not even joking. I have a 1990s montero diesel and it leaks power, and I often forget to disconnect the terminal. So I bought a relay from AliExpress (same one shown in this photo but one size up) and hooked it up with an esp32 an…

This is very close to what the original LoJack did in 1979. They added keypad to replace switching on lights:

[LoJack] could also include the incorporation of a scheme whereby an additional step was required to activate the ignition. Prior to starting, it would require the activation of any number of the usual vehicle features such as the radio, headlight switch, or other switched device. Without knowledge of the proper procedure, it would be almost impossible to activate the ignition. Modern transponder key based systems made the original LoJack starting system obsolete

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LoJack

Re: A surprisingly simple way to foil car thieves

#154

Post by x86x87 »

the__alchemist wrote: post #138
gorkish wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our local police department had a guy get his squad car stolen TWICE during traffic stops, and they installed an ignition interlock switch on their entire flee to prevent it happening again. Also they relegated the guy to motorcycle duty after that. Another story is once my friend called me for help because his car would't start. I looked it over; tested his battery etc, but it wouldn't turn over. I asked him if he h…

Wow! Who steals a police car, and with the cop nearby? Would love to hear more.

You wouldn't steal a car!

https://youtu.be/ALZZx1xmAzg

Re: A surprisingly simple way to foil car thieves

#156

Post by teleforce »

Most of these car thieves are probably repeated offenders. You need to catch them not only foiling them. The simplest way to catch and prevent these petty thieves is to enable the car's available 360 camera (or install after market solutions) that always monitor its surroundings and backup this data to the cloud (could be real-time connection or intermittently with local-first technology). The camera data should be kept only for several days and rotated as any backup in order to keep the cloud storage affordable for the masses. This simple way should easily catch more than 99% of the car thieves even the most sophisticated ones.

Re: A surprisingly simple way to foil car thieves

#157

Post by henryfjordan »

Eisenstein wrote: post #125
henryfjordan wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you could get that robot-cooks-as-you-drive idea right, even without the self-driving bit, you can out-compete Dominos by saving half the trips (back to store from delivery address). The technology was immature but the fundamentals were there, and they'd save a not-insignificant amount of gas.

> they'd save a not-insignificant amount of gas I wonder the efficiencies of cooking in a vehicle as opposed to a fixed pizza oven.

It all comes down to insulation I'd assume

Re: A surprisingly simple way to foil car thieves

#158

Post by chriskanan »

K0balt wrote: post #84

1.2 million grant for this? Now I’ve seen grift, but come on. I want to hire their grant writer. Literally a relay in the starter lead. This looks like one of my afternoon projects, and I’m not even joking. I have a 1990s montero diesel and it leaks power, and I often forget to disconnect the terminal. So I bought a relay from AliExpress (same one shown in this photo but one size up) and hooked it up with an esp32 an…

Here is the link to the award (I think): https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2245223&His...

Probably half the award is taken up by indirect costs at the university, leaving the remainder for a few PhD students to be funded, money for the devices, and any studies where they are probably paying participants to use the device.

$1.2M doesn't go that far in terms of grants. As far as whether this is a good investment for the government's money, I'm a lot less clear. Given all of the recent car thefts due to TikTok, I assume that influenced NSF and the reviewers.

Re: A surprisingly simple way to foil car thieves

#159

Post by jedberg »

The main problem here is that manufacturers aren't incentivized to make great security systems for their cars. There isn't a ton of press about cars getting stolen like there is about data privacy.

Imagine if the folks who built FaceID, TouchID, and Secure Enclave were tasked with building car security. Cars are a lot more expensive than phones and laptops, it would be worth the $50 or $100 in extra hardware to secure them.

And as an added bonus, you wouldn't even need a key anymore because you could start your car with your face. :)

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