Immobilizers are mandatory in EU since 1998, so yes.

Apparently some modern US Hyundai models don't have immobilizers:

https://www.thedrive.com/news/how-thieves-are-stealing-hyund...

> In what universe is 20+ years "recently"?

One day, you too will be old.

It might be, my 15 year old Getz has one (I know because it plays up sometimes due to poor conductivity), but that was never released in the US.

We had them that long too, just like card readers, we just didn't have laws requiring them. No Europe wasn't more advanced than Americans (and still aren't) but they did have better laws for the situation. So you can have that win I suppose.