Hacker News Reader

Comment by jasonjayr | Hacker News Reader

Find the telematic's antenna, and put a 50ohm resistor across it. It can scream into it's own private void.

It seems like this is not enough:

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/simpler-solution-for-dis...

The most reliable way to permanently silence the cellular modem is to pull the relevant fuse. In the above case, this also disables the microphone, which I think is a positive. Unplugging the DCM entirely, however, seems to disable to right speaker, which is wired through the DCM for some reason.

Would be darkly hilarious if they were using the speaker or rear defroster as a cellular antenna.

(Yeah, technically horrible but I’m sure someone will find a way)

Funny enough i was just recently thinking about how most defrosters would probably make a great antenna with minor modifications

They get off the frequency when heated, might not pass FCC testing.

Just recently? The industry has been thinking about it[1][2][3][4] since before most of us were born.

[1] https://patents.google.com/patent/US3576576A/en

[2] https://patents.google.com/patent/US3611388A/en

[3] https://patents.google.com/patent/US3971029A/en

[4] https://patents.google.com/patent/US4095228A/en

>Unplugging the DCM entirely, however, seems to disable to right speaker, which is wired through the DCM for some reason.

I'm cynical, but unnecessarily coupling the ability to send telemetry with some feature people definitely want seems like exactly the sort of thing that would be done intentionally.

>right speaker, which is wired through the DCM for some reason

This is to provide cell phone audio during calls – if you're already inside your dashboard to remove the DCM (modem), there is an easy pin-out to restore the right speaker's music audio (which varies across Toyota models, but usually is as simple as placing a jumper across two pins of the unplugged wiring harness.

I Have No Antenna, and I Must Transmit.

I am stealing this for the name of my first album.

Here you go:

https://imgur.com/a/AR2iLjw

It varies by car. For my Honda, I believe disconnecting the antenna is enough. I looked at a Toyota and the antenna is shared. To disable the phone-home you had to disconnect a box … but that’s difficult. The box is also designed to call 911 or 999 emergency services and is connected to the microphone and one of the speakers. You have to rewire those if you want to use the microphone with your cellphone or play any stereo sound. Do your research before buying or disconnecting things.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com