Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Current State of Smart Locks

schuylertowne.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 53 posts

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#41

Post by marcosdumay »

chestnut-tree wrote: post #4

A good related article about locks from the BBC: Is the traditional metal key becoming obsolete? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-29817520 I'm quite conservative when it comes to locks for the home and prefer the traditional mechanical lock and key. I like the Lockitron feature of recording when a lock is opened/closed but that could be integrated into a mechanical lock without requiring the lock itself to operate…

> You drop a key in water and it's okay.

Exactly like an RFID token.

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#42

Post by lutorm »

I'm somewhat disenchanted with the prospects of keeping a house safe with the use of a lock. Even if the lock itself is perfectly safe, any sliding doors or windows are easy points of entry. And even if those aren't an option, many doors and frames are flimsy enough that a prybar or a ram will split them.

Sure, there are ways around all of these, but you'd end up feeling like you live in a prison...

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#43

Post by caf »

lutorm wrote: post #42

I'm somewhat disenchanted with the prospects of keeping a house safe with the use of a lock. Even if the lock itself is perfectly safe, any sliding doors or windows are easy points of entry. And even if those aren't an option, many doors and frames are flimsy enough that a prybar or a ram will split them. Sure, there are ways around all of these, but you'd end up feeling like you live in a prison...

There's also removing a couple of tiles from the roof.

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#44

Post by emhart »

caf wrote: post #43
lutorm wrote: post #42

I'm somewhat disenchanted with the prospects of keeping a house safe with the use of a lock. Even if the lock itself is perfectly safe, any sliding doors or windows are easy points of entry. And even if those aren't an option, many doors and frames are flimsy enough that a prybar or a ram will split them. Sure, there are ways around all of these, but you'd end up feeling like you live in a prison...

There's also removing a couple of tiles from the roof.

The rififcoup!

So named for the fabulous film Rififi, in which burglars rented an apartment, then drilled through the ceiling to the floor below. This was a direct reference to the French criminal anarchist Alexandre Marius Jacob who famously carried out just such an attack in the early 20th century. At his trial (for murder, among other things) he uttered one of my favorite quotes. He was asked what had become of him, he had traveled the world as a sailor, he was educated, how had he become a murderous anarchist. To which he replied:

"I have seen the world. It is not beautiful."

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#45

Post by WalterBright »

> who want to bring a keyless hotel lock experience to the US

No thanks. Those keyless hotel locks fail too often when I use them to ever want them for my home. At least in the hotel, I can go back to the front desk and they'll fix it. I also don't care for the slowness of operating them vs a regular key.

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#46

Post by Pyrodogg »

bravo22 wrote: post #37
Pyrodogg wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lockitron is also working on controlling existing electronic strikes. https://lockitron.com/store/buzzer

They're not working on it as something new. That was their first product many years ago.

Interesting, i'd never heard about that until pretty recently. To be honest, when I think of Lokitron all I think of is the deadbolt product, and then mostly manufacturing/shipping delays.

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#47

Post by pjc50 »

ianburrell wrote: post #38
prawn wrote: post #21

Could the power/charging issue be handled by a rotatable handle/component that can charge up a battery if it goes flat and leaves you outside? A bit like the wind-up torches you see around the place? Or would it require minutes and minutes of manpower to realistically charge?

Another idea to provide backup power is to have backup battery in the "key". The key wouldn't be need to be mechanical, but electronic, and could provide the juice for emergencies. Another option would be a "key" that acts as microUSB adapter to provide power from phone.

Providing power through the key makes it an attack surface (what if I supply 5kV? can I use it for power-analysis attacks? etc)

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#48

Post by crymer11 »

Kwikset makes several deadbolts with keypads and keyZ-Wave support that I've been very pleased with. I'm a big fan of the quick rekeying feature most Kwikset locks have these days so I can always rekey just all my doors and give that key to someone (since putting Z-Wave enabled deadbolts on all my doors would be fairly expensive).

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#49

Post by bharatvasan »

@billyvg - I'm part of the team at August and sorry to hear you're not having the best experience. Auto Unlock is coming to Android soon and we are quickly fixing issues in the field as they come in. Many are new issues that are either specific to the user environment, manufacturing batches or didn't show up in QA/beta. If you wouldn't mind pinging me at bv@august.com, would love to debug any issues your lock might have.

Re: The Current State of Smart Locks

#50

Post by bravo22 »

Pyrodogg wrote: post #46
bravo22 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're not working on it as something new. That was their first product many years ago.

Interesting, i'd never heard about that until pretty recently. To be honest, when I think of Lokitron all I think of is the deadbolt product, and then mostly manufacturing/shipping delays.

Their first product was very similar to the deadbolt one but it was a retrofit electronics for someone else's mechanical deadbolt. It was also powered and had to be connected to Ethernet. I'm going by memory and could be a bit off on the details.

But yeah the deadbolt is a refinement of their earlier product. Which makes me a bit baffled about how badly executed it is the second time around.

Post reply on HN