Car stolen overnight.

Man of Honour
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When i got burgled I remember telling the police I was unlucky to miss them as they only had a 5 minute window, the lady doing the fingerprint checking then proceeded to tell me I was lucky as I likely would be in hospital if I interrupted them. Not sure I agree with her though, don't want to make it easy for burglars.

Sadly I expect like my case, if they get no lead's within a few days the case will get closed, the police are swamped.

Problem is you just never know.
 
Associate
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24 Nov 2017
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That's truly shocking. Watching it happen makes it even more painful. As someone already mentioned this looks like a slick operation. Sorry about your car and hope the insurance company help you out appropriately.

I have a BMW (less desirable than an X3 M40i) with keyless entry that was pre-specced as a part of the comfort pack. Is there a way to disable keyless access altogether to avoid something like this happening? Watching something like this makes me wish that I didn't have it.
 
Man of Honour
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Not sure thats the best idea if people want to barge into your house for your car keys. I leave mine downstairs out of sight from the main door.

It’s that or I never know where the keys are. I have a baseball bat within arms reach and the house cctv/alarm will wake me if them breaking in doesn’t. It depends how logical I’m thinking when I wake up I guess, I’m not the best at logical thought when I’m half asleep. The stairs should act as a good choke point. I don’t sleep much anymore anyway and every noise outside wakes me up in between.

Given my neighbours with several jeeps, McLarens etc outside I doubt they’d target mine.

That said, with our cars in sight on the drive, it does put me off having a more desirable car.
 
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Associate
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I like the idea of those ghost immobiliser systems but know nothing about them really. Would something like that work on keyless entry cars?
Ghost is great, but it only kicks in when they've got into the car. If they've already broken into the house and ransacked it (as they did with mine, when they stole my M135i last year) then in my opinion it's too late - getting the car stolen was bad, but the house being broken into was a lot worse. Saying that, for keyless entry cars, I can see Ghost being far more viable, as they could relay the signal and get into the car but not drive off with it. Personally think something visible like a wheel lock is more of a deterrent, as they know it's more work for them than going to the next house and trying their car...
 
Soldato
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Thanks for the kind words all - it's all been a bit gutting as the car was a one off press spec (it's here in this review https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/bmw/x3/101345/new-bmw-x3-m40i-2018-review) and I'll never find another like it with driver assistant plus, the individual interior etc. But we were considering downsizing to one car now we both work from home, so maybe I can find something else just as enjoyable. The insurance assessor is going to get back to me on Monday.
 
Soldato
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Horrible thing to happen, I hope karma bites them in the ass!

At least your family is unharmed and it’s only really an inconvenience at worst.

My new to me car has keyless entry and I wish it didn’t. The last one I had with it was in 2016 and I remember being worried about it then.

Good luck with the assessor, hopefully you get a decent payout.
 
Soldato
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Thanks for the kind words all - it's all been a bit gutting as the car was a one off press spec (it's here in this review https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/bmw/x3/101345/new-bmw-x3-m40i-2018-review) and I'll never find another like it with driver assistant plus, the individual interior etc. But we were considering downsizing to one car now we both work from home, so maybe I can find something else just as enjoyable. The insurance assessor is going to get back to me on Monday.

Can get one with a better coloured interior next time. :)
 
Caporegime
Joined
29 Jan 2008
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Damn, that's not cool, glad they weren't after the keys too!

It does seem silly how naff car manufacturers are when it comes to technology/security. I mean in theory you could have keyless entry and keep it secure, in reality they've made it **** and their improvement is to just make sure the key doesn't transmit when stationary.

Ideally you ought to be able to brick a stolen car, prevent new keys from being issued/made - I mean these guys have been able to relay the signal from a key... but now they're in the car and they drive away with no key... that's no good - car should shut down if no key detected anymore. If they export and sell in say SA or the Gulf then how does a new key get issued? (that's another potential weak spot to address, could just kill a lot of the market if there was no easy way of operating this car if stolen without the key).
 
Soldato
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20 Jul 2008
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Ideally you ought to be able to brick a stolen car, prevent new keys from being issued/made - I mean these guys have been able to relay the signal from a key... but now they're in the car and they drive away with no key... that's no good - car should shut down if no key detected anymore. If they export and sell in say SA or the Gulf then how does a new key get issued? (that's another potential weak spot to address, could just kill a lot of the market if there was no easy way of operating this car if stolen without the key).

I'd like to know the answer to this. Especially as they're normally dumped for a few days to establish whether or not a tracker is fitted and the vehicle is recovered.

I guess these guys are sophisticated enough to have the gear that grants access to the car and can reprogram keys?
(not sure what has happened with the formatting here)
 
Soldato
OP
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Also shows the flaw with ring. You really need something that alerts your. Like ringing your phone or making a racket...

very sorry to see this OP
It does alert me, but I'd turned off the notifications at night because of the local foxes, badgers and cats constantly setting it off. I've changed the settings now, you can adjust the sensitivity (not that anyone is going to steal my Renault Captur the insurance company gave me as a loan :D)
 
Soldato
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Sorry to see this, but it seems all to common with keyless entry, I remember a report on the TV about a young girl who had just bought a Fiesta ST with the system, was followed to a carpark in a super market and when she locked the car they captured to signal, and took the car, We have a C4 GP and even though it's not desirable we put the keys in faraday bags just in case someone gets desperate lol.
 
Soldato
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I've changed the settings now, you can adjust the sensitivity (not that anyone is going to steal my Renault Captur the insurance company gave me as a loan :D)

If they did it would be pretty ironic given the name.

Sorry to hear this, anyway. Much like everyone else in the thread, watching that video is enough to make blood boil. On the plus side, at least they didn't break in to take the keys by force. Better to wake up in the morning to find the car gone than be woken up by some lowlife threatening you or your family :(
 
Soldato
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17 Jan 2005
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Damn dude, that sucks. :( Hope you get everything sorted with minimal hassle!

They really are *****.

That will be parked up somewhere quiet so they can check if it's got a tracker or not. They'll leave it somewhere for a few days, then come back to it. The idea being that if it has a tracker then the police will have found and recovered it, if it doesn't and it's still there then it's straight down to wherever they're using to strip it for parts.

When mine was stolen it was found a few days later on a side street about a mile away from my house. When I got it back, I noticed there was a new address in the sat nav. I gave it to the police and they said they were aware of it. A while later I saw in the news that there had been raids on several houses in that area, so hopefully at least a few people were nailed for something.
 
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