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Comment by msisk6 | Hacker News Reader

I often dream of going back to a car without any electronics at all.

Of course, I've had those and they have their own problems. Carburetors and point ignition systems have their issues.

So I instead live in a world where even my chainsaw has a CAN bus.

Just a reminder(I remember those times too) that before the advent of immobilisers and electronic ignition locks, any car could be started in about 30 seconds with some very basic tools. Car theft has been absolutely rampant until the mass adoption of immobilisers where it has literally dropped off a cliff - it hasn't stopped thieves completely of course, but it's very much the case of electronics reducing crime by an order of magnitude(at least here in Europe).

You could use a basic flat-head screwdriver for both the door and ignition ... Unreal really

I had an old Mercedes 230TE that could be unlocked and started with any flattish piece of metal roughly the same size and shape as the key.

Once I went out to the car early one morning to find it parked up exactly where I'd left it, with 200 more miles on the clock, the petrol tank rather more full, and the engine still warm...

My family once found their car in the parking lot of the grocery store with the groceries of someone else already inside the car, and a note and contact info left on the windshield about how this person unlocked my parents’ car thinking it was theirs, accidentally loaded their groceries into the wrong identical vehicle, closed the trunk, and then couldn’t unlock it again after noticing the mistake.

Very gentleman-thief of them. Maybe Lupin needed your car for a bit :)

You can be sure the ignition relay came into the house with me at night after that...

I remember those times too, though I've never had any cars stolen by car thieves. I have lost 4 cars to the tech. That is 4 times the security system bricked my car in a variety of different ways;

I suppose the big difference between a person stealing my car, and the immobilizer stealing my car is that my insurance has to pay out for that first one.

I find it hard to believe you've had 4 cars bricked by faulty electronics.

> I have lost 4 cars to the tech

Could you elaborate? A friend of mine had his car randomly not starting the engine, but fixed it through the replacement of an electronic board, and some mechanics said they could circumvent that.

To be fair those cars are trivial to install your own immobilizer. Autozone will sell you a switch for cheap and you can tuck it under the carpet by the pedals, or install a dummy switch in one of the spare slots on your dash.

I have a Volkswagen T3 from '84 and the most complicated "computerized" part is bus of relays.

Yet the car is trivial to break into. Hell, I've locked myself out a few times and the Key from another T3, a key from a bycicle lock and a nail-file could open the car (but not start it).

My countermeasures are mechanical too, though: hidden circuit breaker, a lock on the steering wheel, one on the gas-pedal and one on the hand-break. All of them easy to circumvent, given some time, but that's one thing thieves often don't have: time to figure out unknows and weird stuff. Actual "security by obscurity" in a way.

> Carburetors and point ignition systems have their issues.

One of which is that if you apply 12V to the coil, you can bump-start the car and it will run. Theft of such cars is truly trivial.

Modern cars are in fact very hard to steal. Just because the car from the article has a flaw that allows you to unlock and start it via canbus, doesn't mean that all modern cars can be stolen like this.

Stealing car is not an only issue in keyless access. A friend of mine has lost a little bit because somebody used to open the car and steal everything costly what was in salon while the car was parked near a mall.

You can bring ECU from the same car, connect some wires and start any modern car just as well. Original ECU won't even know what's going on. We call it "spider". It's not as easy as just powering on ignition sparks, but similar attack.

How do you “silence” the original ECU? Won’t there be bus contention?

Sure, you will also need to drop transmission to replace that ecu too. It all depends on a car.

> One of which is that if you apply 12V to the coil, you can bump-start the car and it will run. Theft of such cars is truly trivial.

Bump start?

Just jump the starter solenoid terminals with one of those remote start buttons or a screwdriver.

Modern car theft in the US is unfortunately all too easy; you point a handgun at someone in their car and tell them to give you their keys. Until those who do that are violently stopped by the state cars will be easy to steal regardless of any technical countermeasures.

Car theft is largely a political problem, not a technical one.

I built a 1994 Toyota pickup and swapped in a OM617a mechanical diesel. It's a really fun party trick to unplug the battery and have it continue running.

In terms of security, it's my most secure vehicle. Mechanical diesel means its gonna need to be glowed which I have it setup as a push button and no thief will know this. As well, my shutoff switch is a toggle switch under the dash I leave to "off". It'll just crank and crank forever. And my biggest security feature? It's a manual transmission. Most see that and won't even try.

Security by obscurity

My first car was a used 1976 MGB. Some models came with an electric overdrive, mine didn’t but it still had the switch in one of the steering wheel stalks. A friend showed me how to switch some wires around so the unused switch would control the fuel pump. That was the extent of my theft protection, with the loose rag top there was no point even locking the doors.

While having fewer computer controls in our cars may beneficial in some ways, theft-prevention is certainly not one of them.

My dad had an early-80s Ford pickup when I was a kid. The cylinder in its ignition switch was broken in a way that you could hop in, turn the ignition switch, start the truck, and drive away -- all without a key. The ONLY thing preventing extremely easy theft was a few tiny pins in a lock cylinder.

This is an extreme case, but it illustrates how easy it was to steal cars before modern theft-prevention: bypass the mechanical lock to connect a couple wires together, and drive it away.

I think nowadays an old car with a manual choke, a stick shift, and a separate coil where you can remove the ignition wire between the coil and the distributor would probably eliminate all theft outside someone just picking the whole thing up with a rollback tow truck. ;)

just remove some fuse that you know for sure prevents car from starting (fuel pump fuse for example) and you don't need to disconnect any wires. sure, you will have to spend additional 20 seconds removing and putting it back every time, but it is simple and safe, unless thieves are willing to go full troubleshooting on why car doesn't start in the middle of the night

I have this. You can drive my truck from 1968 away just with a nail. You don't need any key at all. Not even the doors are locked and you woudn't need it anyway, because its a convertible truck like most of the trucks from that time. Does that make it better?

Hide your own immobilizer switch and leave the nail in the ignition for your own convenience.

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