Prius Theft Rate

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(busyrosy @ Jul 2 2006, 12:45 PM) [snapback]280150[/snapback]</div>

How would a cheap decal that warns your car has a glass breakage sensor work?

 

Vehicle break ins and vandalisim

Vehicle break in: where one breaks into a vehicle to steal valuables that can be seen to get monies for those valuables.

People are always leaving something in plain view: a package, a lap top, a purse, stereo, big speakers, anything that may bring a buck or two at the local pawn shop.

If a person wants to get into your car bad enough they will, the key is to hide anything of value so that it cannot be seen.
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Vanadisim / Crimianl Mischief: Where one causes either a intentional or random act of dammage to anothers property.Egging, scratching, breaking glass, headlights or tail lights, spray painting.

This happens to the best of us & should be reported to the athourities as in information only report.
So that the police will know what area to keep an eye on..

Oneway to combat this is have an alarm system make sure the siren cycles through different tones as it causes one to look around. glass break, motion, hood, hatch & door sensors will give the added protection of full security. Some systems offer a pager that also alerts you of a break in.

You should have the siren speaker mounted in a hard to reach place that is not obstructed for full sound output. Mounted Under the car aimed towards the ground is best, the car would need to be placed on a lift for the speaker install....

Yes seems like a lot of work but your protecting your investment, I have seen cars that have the alarm speaker mounted under the hood :lol: the bad guy opens the hood and cuts the wire alas no sound... :angry:

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(satsuke @ Jul 2 2006, 10:28 AM) [snapback]280080[/snapback]</div>

That's just plain wrong. A simple challenge/response scheme would not require any "udpate" on the fob, or change based on time or any other such weak security scheme. If the car and fob have a "shared secret", the car need only generate a random number, send it to the fob. The fob responds by encrypting the random number with its secret key and transmits the answer to the car. The car compares the encrypted answer with it's own encrypted answer. With any resonable length code this type of security system would be essentially unbreakable in the RF domain.

With that said the the engine immobiliser section in the service manual describes it like the id (secret key) is transmitted directly. Of course that doesn't mean that is actually true but it's certainly possible that the security system was designed by engineer(s) who either didn't know or didn't care about real security. To implement a challenge response capability in the fob/car has been completely practical for about 5 years and so there would be no reason to do anything weaker.

 

Most immobilizer RFID chips are quasi-passive devices, ie, they don't have a power source of their own.. They could be as simple as the resistor in the old GM keys that basically prevented starting if the resistor was not the right value, or an ultra-low power device with a diode and capacitor where a carrier wave broadcast from the vehicle is rectified and stored in the capacitor to provide power to the chip for a short period of time. The processing capabilities of such chips are necessarily limited- most simply broadcast a stored unique ID. Up until recently, systems that can respond to a shared key challenge/response were always active (ie required their own power source) due to the complex computational requirements of the security algorithms.

The smart key system is an active system (powered by its own battery) with a quasi-passive backup (if the fob battery dies, it switches to the batteryless old immobilizer-based security)

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(c4 @ Jul 4 2006, 11:14 AM) [snapback]280981[/snapback]</div>

The "quasi-passive" backup system uses close proximity to form an air-core transformer to provide power and communicate with the fob. It is not really a "passive" system in that sense. The fob electronics have power when the key is in the slot. Certainly enough power is available to operate a challenge/response system, but for this system it is less important because the signal is inductively coupled - it can't be sniffed from outside the car. Even a plain-text code of reasonable length (> ~64 bits) would be quite secure.

 

i just saw a blurb on CNN about thieves using a laptop and special scanner to intercept codes.

the thieves could only do this if they were within about 6 feet of the vehicle as it was being locked. not to tough to do especially if the laptop is in a case and the thieves were not obvious about it. they were actually successful in stealing several high end "super secure" vehicles.

judging by the list of cars taken, dont think they would have been intered in something as cheap as the Prius

 

where can you get a set of those?

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Godiva @ Jul 2 2006, 02:24 PM) [snapback]280158[/snapback]</div>

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(DaveinOlyWA @ Jul 4 2006, 01:20 PM) [snapback]281066[/snapback]</div>

i had my grandma's prius in Portland Oregon last week. I was packing up from college and I was getting ready to drive it back to my home in Wisconsin. I left it in a parking lot in downtown, and I came back a few hours later and it was gone. I came to figure out that two priuses had been stolen from this garage at the same time. The attendents at the garage were not helpful, so that made us suspect their participation in the theft. Both brand new, both locked without the keys. It seems to me that the theft of these two cars was professional job. I do not know why they would steal these two cars, and I wonder what they used it for. IT made me wonder the frequency of the theft of these cars. I have been reading everyone's posts about the key systems, and I know that the computer chip within the key and the computer in the car should make it almost impossible to take these cars so it baffles me how these cars were taken. Does anyone have an answer for this? I have been reading your highly technical explinations for the theft, but I am not quite following so if there are any simpler ways to discribe it any help would be greatly appreciated. So yes, there are thefts of these cars, in a orginized fashon, so it means there is some kind of demand for these cars.

 

there is another post here that talks about it and the theft rate of the Prius was on a weighted scale as 100 being average and the Prius was at 13. i scanned several different models and that was the lowest figure i saw by far.

 

Hi portlandunprius, sorry your first post has to be so sad, especially from here in Oregon. Yes, it's just about impossible to steal a Prius unless you winch it onto a truck and drive away with it. Since the current model started in 2004, with only minor styling variations, there isn't a big aftermarket for "recycled" body parts, certainly not from reputable body shops.

Where exactly did this happen? I don't want to park there! Did the attendants have the fobs? I'd say the parking lot owner is responsible if a Prius is taken from their lot...

When you come back, look up the local Meetup group!

 

I just recently purchased an 07 Prius back in April and was perfectly happy knowing that this car would most likely be at the bottom of the list of cars that were most likely to be stolen. The dealership that sold me my car assured me that without the key inside the car, it would be very difficult for thieves to steal. Also, I am very adament about locking it everynight. So this morning I woke up at 5am to hear a car alarm go off and thought that maybe it was a glitch since my car alarm has gone off once or twice before (both times I looked out the front window to make sure everything was ok). About 20 minutes later my dad came in my room to let me know that his Honda Accord had been stolen right from our driveway. When I went to check on my car I noticed that the driver window had a huge scratch on the top, apparently from an attempted forced entry. I'm so glad my PriPri fought back. However, I've now decided to get LoJack and will put my car in the garage from now on...But seriously, the nerve of some people. This worries me that perhaps Priuses are becoming a target for auto theft.

 

Before purchasing the car, I actually called my insurance agent (State Farm) about this very topic (that and vandalism). They responded that there was not an excessive claims filing rate for the Prius, rather the contrary. I had considered this as I wanted to make sure I had all cost data for consideration of my purchase. This was over a year ago and things may have changed, however.

 

Escalade because its bling. I'm guessing many big work trucks are stolen because its SOP to leave keys in them on job sites. Had a boss get his truck stolen in broad daylight full of tools for 40guys off a job site. Worked with crew of linemen who had 30 brand new huge bucket trucks, drill rigs, telephone poll setters etc and they parked them all with keys in ignition and no real security.

Anyways, see my recent thread about making a "Ute" or Panel Van out of wrecked rear ended Prime, because even mildly rear-ended Primes with what appears to be perfectly fine running gear and under 20K miles are selling for well under 5K, more like 2-4K. That must be because:

1)repairing them to factory specs with Insurance and real Auto Shop is not practical once the unibody etc is even mildly 'affected', so just about any accident is "Totaled" and lots of mildly wrecked cars on the market.

2)these cars are near 100% reliable (knock on wood) for first 200k so no market for used parts.

If you want to steal a $5K vehicle, steal a 2005 nice truck or van. I had my beater 2002 full size GM van stolen with a sharpened screwdriver and pliers to defeat door and ignition locks (now those are my 'spare key' in my tool box LOL).