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Comment by Roodgorf | Hacker News Reader

Wait, so VW has an RFID immobilizer and a physical key? I've only ever seen cars having one or the other.

All European cars since 1998 will have both, because immobilizers are required by law in most of Western Europe.

On most cars, you'll never notice the immobilizer as it's RFID based, passive, and requires no batteries. The only way you'd find it is if you take apart the key fob or have to service the ignition lock, at which point you'll find the RFID antenna ring around it, or if you try to get the key replaced.

> All European cars since 1998 will have both, because immobilizers are required by law in most of Western Europe.

So will some cars produced before 1998. The Audi S2 (listed in the article) is one of those, and was built from 1990 to 1995.

Doesn't help you much if you don't live in Europe. I have a 2015 audi that doesn't require the key to be inserted.

FWIW my honda has a real physical key with an rfid chip. So just duplicating the key won't work unless I get a key with a chip.

At least in Germany, yes. Usually the key is also secured with multiple other techniques and has a 3-dimensional unique pattern, plus additionally magnetic safety features.

And the fact that the car has a steering wheel lock (the steering wheel is locked in the right-most position) is also standard.

Interesting, that seems like a pretty reasonable way to do it. Another case of convenience taking precedence over security, I guess.

The above mentioned vulnerability only applies to very few models, on the North American market, which have the (very costly) extra of keyless entry.

According to my knowledge, keyless entry is even illegal in Germany. (But I am not a lawyer, so I do not know if that applies at all, or if the legal situation just ends up stating that drunk people owning a car with keyless entry may not be close enough to their car that the immobilizer is deactivated)

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