43 ms·

Not my BMW, it's 25 years old and the driver's side door doesn't unlock even if you use a key :P All jokes aside (although it's true about my car), it just see

by sebular 11y ago

Not my BMW, it's 25 years old and the driver's side door doesn't unlock even if you use a key :P All jokes aside (although it's true about my car), it just seems like a fundamental truth that digitally-secured systems always provide convenience at the cost of, well, security.

majormajor 11y ago
It's worth noting that non-digitally-secured cars (pre chip-in-the-key tech) provided very little security themselves. Slim jims, hotwiring... The wireless bit does seem like a big regression over non-wired digital security, though.
- bcook 11y ago
  Speaking from experience (locksmith), you cannot download the skills required to use a slim jim. Well, you kinda can, being that there are books/catalogs that show you where the lock's internal mechanism is, but being able to manipulate it requires more than simply pressing "exploit car radio".
  - majormajor 11y ago
    I never had much problem breaking into my old 80s Toyota truck with a clothes hanger back when I was a new driver who would occasionally lock himself out of his car, but valid point - I know 90s cars especially made it a lot harder. Window smashing is still an option, though!
  - XorNot 11y ago
    You also can't download antennas, SDR hardware or a partner to run the other side of the wireless theft operation.
    - bcook 11y ago
      My critique was regarding tools vs skills.
- Shivetya 11y ago
  Not only this but many cars of the same make had very little variation in their keys meaning that on a dealer lot or even a very busy mall there was a chance you could unlock or start; rarely both; a car other than your own. Personally I had seen this twice in action. First was back in the early nineties I could unlock my friends Escort GT with my key and he could unlock my EXP. Neither could start it. Now my Aunt and Uncle had a Ford Windstar and Mercury Sable. The Sable key could start the Windstar but not unlock it. My Aunt found this out the hard way after a trip to the store where she could not get back in the car. Now my BMW motorcycle uses a keyless ignition but you have to stand so close that I am not sure how well the hack will work. As in close I mean nearly rubbing up to it and only from the left side, from the right if they key is in the pocket away from the bike it won't recognize. There is an emergency key which is an little plastic type that has no power of its own, you can start the bike provided you find that magical point near the dash it actually works; by that I mean it took me and the dealer five minutes to get it to work
  - Ntrails 11y ago
    As I recall, we discovered back in the day that my dads ford key would lock almost any ford he came across, but not unlock them.
    - 0_00_0 11y ago
      To be fair that practically seems like a nonissue compared to the inverse.
superuser2 11y ago
In the "Win" column for digitally-secured systems, the electronic immobilizer basically eliminated auto theft. The cars that are still stolen in significant numbers are the last model-years to not have immobilizers. Car door locks are immaterial anyway, since any thief is just going to break a window. The immobilizer matters, certainly, but even an immobilizer vulnerable to sophisticated attackers is doing two orders of magnitude better than purely mechanical security. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/12/upshot/heres-why-stealing-cars-went-out-of-fashion.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/12/upshot/heres-why-stealing-...
- agumonkey 11y ago
  This article reminds me that I thought old busted stuff were less likely to be stolen. That's why I was pretty confident my very low grade, rusty, ugly single-pedal [1] bike would be safe for a day. Some guys proved me wrong, ripped my far too weak cable locks and did whatever they wanted with what was valuable of that bike (5$ for the metal frame ? the rest was plastic). [1] wear made left pedal unscrew itself over time, I couldn't ride single legged anymore so I took the failing pedal, the seat and went to my appointment.
  - hellbanner 11y ago
    Sorry to hear that. Reminds me of a "best of craiglist" post where a "free washing machine" was left untouched for weeks.. but as soon as a price went on it, it was stolen that evening.
    - agumonkey 11y ago
      Harsh reality : cable locks below 4cm diameters are useless (only useful for young kids I guess). Even fat 2kg cable lock are useless, anyone can rob a bike in a street, the bolder the easier. I'm still waiting for a cheap bike gps 'self powered' tagger so I can use a bike again.
      - nikatwork 11y ago
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
rashkov 11y ago
Cool. What's it like having a 25 year old car? Why'd you choose to stick with it as opposed to getting something newer?
- ryandrake 11y ago
  Not the OP, but having owned a 30 year old car up until recently, I can list a few things I loved about it: 1. It operated on mechanics that I could see and touch and fix with a wrench, as opposed to opaque black box computers. I did not need a code reader to diagnose problems. 2. Thanks to point #1, I had the confidence in the knowledge that it was maintained correctly, the parts were good and soundly installed, that every bolt was tightened to the right torque specification, because I did quite a bit of it myself, and could visually inspect any work that someone else did. 3. Points #1 and #2 let me learn a hell of a lot about car maintenance and how everything works than you can with today's computers-with-wheels. 4. It was built years before every manufacturer decided to make their cars look like identical bars of soap, so it had a distinctive '80s look that you don't see much of anymore. Sadly, the state of California decided that the car had to meet emissions standards that were far stricter than anything the original manufacturer ever dreamed of, so it eventually became impossible to smog. I had to sell it to someone outside the state and I'm currently driving a boring bar of soap.
  - icefo 11y ago
    Maybe you could have tuned the carbs super lean (temporarily to pass emission) and installed a catalytic. Might have worked
- mappu 11y ago
  My car is about 20 years old. In my country it's far more normal to buy a cheap car outright (say 2.5k USD) rather than get a lease or a loan for a new car (say 25k USD). There's nothing wrong with it, i'm not sure why i'd want a newer one.
  - TheSpiceIsLife 11y ago
    Hi from cross the Tasman! My daily driver is a 1988 Mazda 323 hatchback. It cost me $900 and had just had the autotrans reconditioned and a new radiator before I bought it. I recently put new front break pads in and will do the rear breaks shortly. For my own personal, and endless, amusement: I paid more for my phone than I did my car.
doublerebel 11y ago
Tnis is not a far comparison. Very few modern cars can hold a candle to an E30 :)

by sebular 11y ago

majormajor 11y ago

It's worth noting that non-digitally-secured cars (pre chip-in-the-key tech) provided very little security themselves. Slim jims, hotwiring... The wireless bit does seem like a big regression over non-wired digital security, though.

bcook 11y ago
Speaking from experience (locksmith), you cannot download the skills required to use a slim jim. Well, you kinda can, being that there are books/catalogs that show you where the lock's internal mechanism is, but being able to manipulate it requires more than simply pressing "exploit car radio".
- majormajor 11y ago
  I never had much problem breaking into my old 80s Toyota truck with a clothes hanger back when I was a new driver who would occasionally lock himself out of his car, but valid point - I know 90s cars especially made it a lot harder. Window smashing is still an option, though!
- XorNot 11y ago
  You also can't download antennas, SDR hardware or a partner to run the other side of the wireless theft operation.
  - bcook 11y ago
    My critique was regarding tools vs skills.
Shivetya 11y ago
Not only this but many cars of the same make had very little variation in their keys meaning that on a dealer lot or even a very busy mall there was a chance you could unlock or start; rarely both; a car other than your own. Personally I had seen this twice in action. First was back in the early nineties I could unlock my friends Escort GT with my key and he could unlock my EXP. Neither could start it. Now my Aunt and Uncle had a Ford Windstar and Mercury Sable. The Sable key could start the Windstar but not unlock it. My Aunt found this out the hard way after a trip to the store where she could not get back in the car. Now my BMW motorcycle uses a keyless ignition but you have to stand so close that I am not sure how well the hack will work. As in close I mean nearly rubbing up to it and only from the left side, from the right if they key is in the pocket away from the bike it won't recognize. There is an emergency key which is an little plastic type that has no power of its own, you can start the bike provided you find that magical point near the dash it actually works; by that I mean it took me and the dealer five minutes to get it to work
- Ntrails 11y ago
  As I recall, we discovered back in the day that my dads ford key would lock almost any ford he came across, but not unlock them.
  - 0_00_0 11y ago
    To be fair that practically seems like a nonissue compared to the inverse.

superuser2 11y ago

In the "Win" column for digitally-secured systems, the electronic immobilizer basically eliminated auto theft. The cars that are still stolen in significant numbers are the last model-years to not have immobilizers. Car door locks are immaterial anyway, since any thief is just going to break a window. The immobilizer matters, certainly, but even an immobilizer vulnerable to sophisticated attackers is doing two orders of magnitude better than purely mechanical security. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/12/upshot/heres-why-stealing-cars-went-out-of-fashion.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/12/upshot/heres-why-stealing-...

agumonkey 11y ago
This article reminds me that I thought old busted stuff were less likely to be stolen. That's why I was pretty confident my very low grade, rusty, ugly single-pedal [1] bike would be safe for a day. Some guys proved me wrong, ripped my far too weak cable locks and did whatever they wanted with what was valuable of that bike (5$ for the metal frame ? the rest was plastic). [1] wear made left pedal unscrew itself over time, I couldn't ride single legged anymore so I took the failing pedal, the seat and went to my appointment.
- hellbanner 11y ago
  Sorry to hear that. Reminds me of a "best of craiglist" post where a "free washing machine" was left untouched for weeks.. but as soon as a price went on it, it was stolen that evening.
  - agumonkey 11y ago
    Harsh reality : cable locks below 4cm diameters are useless (only useful for young kids I guess). Even fat 2kg cable lock are useless, anyone can rob a bike in a street, the bolder the easier. I'm still waiting for a cheap bike gps 'self powered' tagger so I can use a bike again.
    - nikatwork 11y ago

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

rashkov 11y ago

Cool. What's it like having a 25 year old car? Why'd you choose to stick with it as opposed to getting something newer?

ryandrake 11y ago
Not the OP, but having owned a 30 year old car up until recently, I can list a few things I loved about it: 1. It operated on mechanics that I could see and touch and fix with a wrench, as opposed to opaque black box computers. I did not need a code reader to diagnose problems. 2. Thanks to point #1, I had the confidence in the knowledge that it was maintained correctly, the parts were good and soundly installed, that every bolt was tightened to the right torque specification, because I did quite a bit of it myself, and could visually inspect any work that someone else did. 3. Points #1 and #2 let me learn a hell of a lot about car maintenance and how everything works than you can with today's computers-with-wheels. 4. It was built years before every manufacturer decided to make their cars look like identical bars of soap, so it had a distinctive '80s look that you don't see much of anymore. Sadly, the state of California decided that the car had to meet emissions standards that were far stricter than anything the original manufacturer ever dreamed of, so it eventually became impossible to smog. I had to sell it to someone outside the state and I'm currently driving a boring bar of soap.
- icefo 11y ago
  Maybe you could have tuned the carbs super lean (temporarily to pass emission) and installed a catalytic. Might have worked
mappu 11y ago
My car is about 20 years old. In my country it's far more normal to buy a cheap car outright (say 2.5k USD) rather than get a lease or a loan for a new car (say 25k USD). There's nothing wrong with it, i'm not sure why i'd want a newer one.
- TheSpiceIsLife 11y ago
  Hi from cross the Tasman! My daily driver is a 1988 Mazda 323 hatchback. It cost me $900 and had just had the autotrans reconditioned and a new radiator before I bought it. I recently put new front break pads in and will do the rear breaks shortly. For my own personal, and endless, amusement: I paid more for my phone than I did my car.

doublerebel 11y ago

Tnis is not a far comparison. Very few modern cars can hold a candle to an E30 :)