[ad_1]
Smartphones can do amazing things, but who knew that they could also help you hack expensive expensive electric cars and take them away.
ELECTrek reports that a car thief probably used a smartphone to unlock a Tesla Model 3, which was on display at the Mall of America in Minnesota. according to ELECTrek, a cybersecurity specialist suspects that the man who stole the car probably added the vehicle identification number (VIN) to his Tesla account after a call to the company's customer service. Once the car connected to his account and his phone, it allowed him to unlock the car and leave.
"By doing this, you can now control the Tesla from an app on your phone," said Mark Lanterman, forensic computer expert, in an interview with Fox 9.
The reader reports that the thief made it 1,000 miles from Minnesota before being hunted down by authorities in Waco, Texas.
He tried to avoid the capture by turning off the car's GPS, but the owner overtook him by passing the car's charging places to the authorities.
The owner of the car rental company, John Marino, said the suspect was a person he knew.
"We suspected it was him because he boasted of everything he knew about the car and his safety, and that was someone who had the means to get there, "explained Marino.
Tesla Model 3 becomes the best-selling car in the US https://t.co/Bxhmz5epGO pic.twitter.com/B1xE5K44qG
– CleanTechnica (@cleantechnica) September 9, 2018
This story raises questions about the level of safety of the Tesla Model 3, and it seems that the answer is more difficult than an ordinary car.
Marino added that Teslas, on the whole, is quite difficult to fly successfully, as the company collects a lot of information about its users and the driving history of the vehicle.
"Tesla is not the car to fly," he said. "The amount of data collected by Tesla is actually pretty scary."
ELECTrek points out that it is not unusual for Tesla to allow customers to add VINs to their account so they can use the app on their phone as a key. The thief would have been able to take advantage of this, so maybe another level of security should be added.
Tesla told Electrek that the thief was able to unlock the car because he had already rented it, but the leasing company said it had disabled the suspect's access after he returned it.
[ad_2]
Source link
