8 ms·

Nothing new, has been going on for a while now. Market is already providing your own "cage of Faraday[0]" for your fob. [0]https://www.amazon.com/faraday-cage-

Nothing new, has been going on for a while now. Market is already providing your own "cage of Faraday[0]" for your fob. [0]https://www.amazon.com/faraday-cage-key-fob/s?page=1&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3Afaraday%20cage%20key%20fob https://www.amazon.com/faraday-cage-key-fob/s?page=1&rh=i%3A...

sofaofthedamned 8y ago
Yeah this has been a thing for years in the UK. Myself and my wife put our keys into a metal lunch box in the hallway which mitigates this problem, which was prompted by both next door neighbours getting their cars broken into.
- mysterydip 8y ago
  Top Gear did a thing on this during their one road trip: https://youtu.be/-aU09WT5rXg https://youtu.be/-aU09WT5rXg fast forward to the 3 minute mark
  - sofaofthedamned 8y ago
    Exactly. Luckily i've got a Kia which nobody wanted to steal, but it's definitely a well known attack vector. A car on one side got stolen, the other side 'just' had stuff stolen from it.
    - wkearney99 8y ago
      Wait until bad weather. I had an utterly clapped-out Jeep Cherokee stolen one cold-as-hell winter night. Sure enough, found two neighborhoods over... a fair walking distance from where the last late night bus would have dropped someone off. So, yeah, a stolen beater is just fine when it's freezing cold outside...
      - sofaofthedamned 8y ago
        Good point. We've got a new (year old) Kia Ceed, and a 15 year old Ford Focus. I'd imagine if somebody needed a ride they'd just take the Focus. Either way we've got the cameras outside which, along with the fact we don't have a Jaguar or a BMW outside probably makes us less likely to be turned over.
retSava 8y ago
Since most car manufacturers seem to be vulnerable (to my knowledge), I assume all or most buy the same COTS keyfob + electronic lock product. Much like Takata airbags or Bosch ECUs. Being a step away from the problem probably helps keep that OEM manufacturer from strapping in and solving it. They don't feel any pain from it.
- kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
  Before the keyfobs become poplar there were transponder keys with embedded RFIDs. While still attackable, they aren't actively pinging their car and revealing their presence like the fobs do.
  - cptskippy 8y ago
    > Before the keyfobs become poplar there were transponder keys with embedded RFIDs. Tesla is using an NXP Athena OS based smartcard that uses the Java Card 2.2 platform for it's NFC Key on the Model 3.
- mikeash 8y ago
  The vulnerability is pretty much inherent to the idea. No amount of encryption can protect you from a relay attack. The only foolproof mitigation is to enforce a short round trip time to ensure the fob is actually close to the car, but with the short distances involved that means the fob has to generate and transmit a response within a few nanoseconds.
  - improbable22 8y ago
    As long as the fob's own delay is very consistent, I don't see why you couldn't time the signal. Edit: there's a discussion down the page somewhere. The issue seems to be that (for power reasons) they use low-freq radio, on which it's hard to get timing accurate enough for 10m distance changes.
  - alistproducer2 8y ago
    I disagree. A physical switch on the key itself which opened a circuit to the decryption key would mean the key would need to physically be in the possession of the driver.
dave7 8y ago
I use these Faraday cage pouches for my new car keys (I got the two-pack listed "Amazon choice" in the above link) and they are excellent. As far as I can tell anyhow - my car hasn't been stolen (yet!) and if I keep the key in it's pouch I can neither open the doors or start the engine even if I'm right next to the vehicle. An added bonus, it also makes the keys much more comfortable to have in a pocket, holds them in a fairly flat orientation - and stops them from scratching a phone!
- bradknowles 8y ago
  I've had these. They worked for a while. But then I guess the metalized fabric wore through or something, because after a while they no longer kept the car from starting. The smallest ones I could find would actually hold two fobs, but when filled were large and uncomfortable enough in my pocket that I preferred to just keep the fobs naked. I still haven't found a good solution that actually works for keeping passive fobs secure while they are actually in my pocket.

sofaofthedamned 8y ago

Yeah this has been a thing for years in the UK. Myself and my wife put our keys into a metal lunch box in the hallway which mitigates this problem, which was prompted by both next door neighbours getting their cars broken into.

mysterydip 8y ago
Top Gear did a thing on this during their one road trip: https://youtu.be/-aU09WT5rXg https://youtu.be/-aU09WT5rXg fast forward to the 3 minute mark
- sofaofthedamned 8y ago
  Exactly. Luckily i've got a Kia which nobody wanted to steal, but it's definitely a well known attack vector. A car on one side got stolen, the other side 'just' had stuff stolen from it.
  - wkearney99 8y ago
    Wait until bad weather. I had an utterly clapped-out Jeep Cherokee stolen one cold-as-hell winter night. Sure enough, found two neighborhoods over... a fair walking distance from where the last late night bus would have dropped someone off. So, yeah, a stolen beater is just fine when it's freezing cold outside...
    - sofaofthedamned 8y ago
      Good point. We've got a new (year old) Kia Ceed, and a 15 year old Ford Focus. I'd imagine if somebody needed a ride they'd just take the Focus. Either way we've got the cameras outside which, along with the fact we don't have a Jaguar or a BMW outside probably makes us less likely to be turned over.

retSava 8y ago

Since most car manufacturers seem to be vulnerable (to my knowledge), I assume all or most buy the same COTS keyfob + electronic lock product. Much like Takata airbags or Bosch ECUs. Being a step away from the problem probably helps keep that OEM manufacturer from strapping in and solving it. They don't feel any pain from it.

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
Before the keyfobs become poplar there were transponder keys with embedded RFIDs. While still attackable, they aren't actively pinging their car and revealing their presence like the fobs do.
- cptskippy 8y ago
  > Before the keyfobs become poplar there were transponder keys with embedded RFIDs. Tesla is using an NXP Athena OS based smartcard that uses the Java Card 2.2 platform for it's NFC Key on the Model 3.
mikeash 8y ago
The vulnerability is pretty much inherent to the idea. No amount of encryption can protect you from a relay attack. The only foolproof mitigation is to enforce a short round trip time to ensure the fob is actually close to the car, but with the short distances involved that means the fob has to generate and transmit a response within a few nanoseconds.
- improbable22 8y ago
  As long as the fob's own delay is very consistent, I don't see why you couldn't time the signal. Edit: there's a discussion down the page somewhere. The issue seems to be that (for power reasons) they use low-freq radio, on which it's hard to get timing accurate enough for 10m distance changes.
- alistproducer2 8y ago
  I disagree. A physical switch on the key itself which opened a circuit to the decryption key would mean the key would need to physically be in the possession of the driver.

dave7 8y ago

I use these Faraday cage pouches for my new car keys (I got the two-pack listed "Amazon choice" in the above link) and they are excellent. As far as I can tell anyhow - my car hasn't been stolen (yet!) and if I keep the key in it's pouch I can neither open the doors or start the engine even if I'm right next to the vehicle. An added bonus, it also makes the keys much more comfortable to have in a pocket, holds them in a fairly flat orientation - and stops them from scratching a phone!

bradknowles 8y ago
I've had these. They worked for a while. But then I guess the metalized fabric wore through or something, because after a while they no longer kept the car from starting. The smallest ones I could find would actually hold two fobs, but when filled were large and uncomfortable enough in my pocket that I preferred to just keep the fobs naked. I still haven't found a good solution that actually works for keeping passive fobs secure while they are actually in my pocket.