Keypads don’t make the vehicle more secure against theft.
The keypad entry code is 5 digits, but there are only 5 buttons, so there are 3125 possible combinations.
Divide that by 2 because one of two codes will work (your code or the factory code; this is necessary so that if you forget your code, there’s a backup). That’s 1563 possible codes to open the door.
But if someone wants to steal the car, they’re going to have a thousand options and it doesn’t matter if they have your key code, your door code, or anything else.
First, they can just put the vehicle on a tow truck. Happens all the time. Nobody pays attention to this. They will then have days to turn off the GPS if it’s even enabled.
Second-through-1000th…There are so many remote access vulnerabilities that make the key fob irrelevant.
A few examples of attack from a research paper on automobile security:
Vulnerability analysis. For each access vector category, we investigate one or more concrete examples in depth and assess the level of actual exposure. In each case we find the existence of practically exploitable vulnerabilities that permit arbitrary automotive control without requiring direct physical access. Among these, we demonstrate the ability to compromise a car via
vulnerable diagnostics equipment widely used by mechanics, through the
media player via inadvertent playing of a specially modified song in WMA format, via vulnerabilities in
hands-free Bluetooth functionality and, finally, by
calling the car’s cellular modem and playing a carefully crafted audio signal encoding both an exploit and a bootstrap loader for additional remote-control functionality.
After they investigate these specific examples, they demonstrate that someone can take control of or cause issues with the vehicle via, for example, the TPMS radio in your tires. Or they can monitor and send audio to the vehicle, including sending commands to the vehicle’s voice-command system.
And the engine immobilizers don’t need your key fob nearby to respond to a query, which means they’re vulnerable even if there’s no key fob around. Some of these attacks are related to things other than stealing the vehicle, but are no less concerning.
Or you can just live with the knowledge that if someone wants your car, they can just pick it up and take it.
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