Car 'broken' into with no signs of entry.

I've posted this elsewhere with 'interesting' replies so I thought I'd try a more sensible group. ;-)

A neighbour called yesterday morning to say the driver's door on my '97 BMW 528 was open. As it was, and the car had been gone through and the change I keep in the box behind the handbrake gone - only about 5 quid or so used for parking meters etc.

This isn't the first time this has happened. Several times over the 10 years I've owned the car, and each time only this money stolen. So not a 'pro' who could get more for the spare wheel or whatever.

The difference is this time I am positive it was locked - I arrived home about 24.00 with a passenger, and after leaving the car he remembered he had a coat in the boot. I went to get it and only opened the boot using the remote, and checked it was locked after closing. (The remote system provided has a separate button for allowing access to the boot without unlocking the entire car)

So whoever it was had a means of opening the car without any signs being left.

The car is parked in the street, and this time near outside the same neighbour's house. He is pretty certain the alarm didn't go off as both he and his wife are light sleepers, and their bedroom at the front. With the window open.

On other occasions, I couldn't be 100% certain I'd locked the car. This time I was.

If the car was somehow unlocking itself, I'd expect to find it thus on a number of occasions. But the only times have been when it's been rifled through.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)
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I dunno about defeating the alarm[1], but I noticed an AA man gaining entry to a car using those Winbag double glazing tools, so I presume they are known about by the criminal fraternity ...

[1] Actually wasn't there a vulnerability in the KeyLoq chips used by many car remotes? No idea whether it affects Beamers.
Reply to
Andy Burns

If you open the car with a key having locked it with the remote and therefore set the alarm, the alarm sounds until you insert a master key in the ignition and switch on. So a plain key - like the valet one, or some form of device to hook the lock open would still set off the alarm. Of course it may have. Stupidly I forgot to look at the flashing LED which will say if the alarm has been triggered. And should have looked to see if it had been switched off.

Interesting. I'll do some Googling. But I'd be surprised if the thief had any sophisticated device - as he'd have gone for other cars in the street at the same time.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember "Dave Plowman (News)" saying something like:

There was a snippet on the telly recently about cheap Chinese code jammers flooding the market. Basically, when you go to set the alarm, the jammer stops the alarm receiving the signal, and a lot of the time people don't check for the flash or clunk/beep, just assume that it's done as they're walking away. In this snippet, it was a couple of lads on bicycles who were hanging around using it, and nobody paid them any particular attention. They'd come back later and open the doors with no worries. It was only that one bloke asked his neighbours and several of their cars had been done on the same occasion - more than once, iirc.

Reply to
Grimly Curmudgeon

It may be worth buying a steering wheel disclock "clam". Bright yellow 2-part "claim" which encloses the steering wheel, think they are "Disklok" on Ebay. Older versions used a huge CISA padlock, later versions an integral lock. Versions for cars with and without airbags and different steering wheel sizes. It will not stop them getting in (they can still destroy the seating, trim, dashboard, headliner which can run into several thousand), but it does put people off onto the next vehicle.

Disable the link between power lock & alarm. If they defeat the alarm they still have to defeat the lock which adds surprise & risk to their endeavours. It does mean you must manually lock the doors, but that is not really that big an issue. It removes the risk of the alarm malfunctioning - with the car sat there repeatedly opening its doors (moisture, condensation, alarm malfunction, bad solder joint, battery voltage dropped too low can cause weird behaviour).

Reply to
js.b1

Someone has hacked your car locking system using an electronic device. I understand this is not uncommon. Outside my parent's house this happened to 2 cars in one night.

Reply to
Steve Slatcher

I thought of that immediately on seeing this; however, the jammers stop the car locking and the thieves rely on the owners not checking it's locked and not noticing that it doesn't flash. The thieves returned on bikes at 3am and were recorded on CCTV. Probably not the case here.

I'd think they've got a key (lost, stolen, obtained from a former owner or a garage that have sold or serviced it). If they've got a means of unlocking cars, you probably need another alarm device.

Reply to
Onetap

Did you manually check all the doors? I used to have a car that sometimes didn't lock the rear passenger side door - I would hear the clunk, the lights would flash and the drivers door would lock and as I don't often try to open the rear door when the car is locked I have no idea how long it had been like that before I noticed.

Perhaps you have a similar problem? Given the age of your car it is quite possible that one of the central locking motors/actuators is perhaps not as reliable as it was and, as you say, this doesn't look like the work of a professional thief so I think a problem with the central locking is more likely than high tech jammers or hacking.

Reply to
Gareth

Dave Plowman (News) explained :

Does your car 'complain' if it fails to correctly lock itself?

Mine generates a bleep if it finds it cannot correctly lock itself.

Reply to
Harry Bloomfield

Yep - this is becoming more widespread.

The initial hack was actually just a jammer which jammed the locking signal, and very few people actually check that the remote locking works.

However, devices which actually defeat the encryption have been found now, and can thus unlock a locked car. It was also BMW's attacked in the case I heard of at work.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

There was a fashion at one time in France for busting open cars with a half tennis ball. You put the half ball over the lock and then whack it with the palm of the your hand. I don't know if this had been sorted by the time your car was made. Left no sign of course and the driver gets the blame.

Peter Scott

Reply to
Peter Scott

Only works on cars with pneumatically operated locks. I very much doubt Dave's Bimmer has this.

Reply to
Huge

The classic one I heard of..possibly urban myth - was to whack the front bumper of a jaguar with a rubber mallet. The crash detection switches then unlocked all the doors..

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

Does it? I remember hearing about the tennis ball 'trick' years ago, but with no detail. I always assumed it was that the blast of air somehow tripped the latch mechanism (which always did seem a bit unlikely, given the design of car lock mechanisms that I have seen - they don't take much force to move, but airflow through the lock cylinder would be unlikely to push anything in the right direction)

cheers

Jules

Reply to
Jules Richardson

Jamming a remote would be easy enough. Capturing the code - and working out the next one - rather more difficult. But as I said on this occasion the car was definitely locked.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

I'd have noticed by now. ;-)

Nope. The boot lock actuator failed some time ago and I replaced it. All the door ones are fine.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

Yes - that's been suggested. And would make sense if the car is set to lock the doors when you start up. But surely this would be disabled when the car is parked up and alarmed?

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

On one of the first cars fitted with airbags, the local youth didn't take long to discover you could set them off in a similar way when parked up. "But surely?" - No.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

I've heard the same story about the Sierra XR4i, from someone who had his stolen, used as a getaway vehicle, and recovered by the police. But that was years ago, I'd expect modern cars to have learnt from early mistakes, even if remote locking has introduced new vulnerabilities in the meantime.

Reply to
Alan Braggins

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember snipped-for-privacy@cucumber.demon.co.uk (Andrew Gabriel) saying something like:

A few years ago there was a minor craze amongst scrotes in Germany for ramming a wall with a stolen motor, in the knowledge the airbags would save them from injury. Turned out some of them didn't work too well. I think the craze died out.

Reply to
Grimly Curmudgeon

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