The scary part is not the GPS installed by the fleet company that previously owned the car, which in all likelihood was just forgotten there, but the GPS and eSIM that comes with most (all?) new cars and that in most (all?) new cars cannot be disabled.
Apart from privacy concerns of your data being used or sold by the car vendor, government outreach is also a concern. There was a bill announced in the US for all new cars to be equipped with "driver impairment" tech which was called a "kill switch". Media rushed to say it's not really a kill switch, just "sensors or cameras to monitor the driver’s behaviors, head or eye movements" and "block the driver from operating the vehicle". So... a kill switch. https://apnews.com/article/fact-checking-402773429497
Anyway, I'm staying with my old gas Honda until it dies which is probably never with proper maintenance and eventually restoration. I'll never go electric. Modern cars are just smartphones on wheels at this point, and smartphones are just spying devices at this point.
> “can I get free data from the SIM card embedded in the device that I now technically own?”
That seems like the next-most-interesting question now that you've determined what the device is. Possibly followed closely by "can I use that free-to-me data in a fun way that might teach the people who installed the SIM to deactivate their devices when they sell them?"
i.e. Could you send and receive enough on the connection using that SIM to cost them enough money that they'd notice it?
- Headline "My new car has a mysterious and undocumented switch".
No, this is not a new car. This is a used car. Finding undocumented switches in a vehicle someone else owned is very common. People modify their cars all the time. Finding an undocumented switch in a new car would be wild.
- "And that’s how the search comes to an end. After a bit of perseverance I figured out what it is."
You literally took your car to a dealership, and the mechanic told you what it was. This ENTIRE ARTICLE boils down to this statement. You did the bare minimum to investigate what it was: took the panel off and confirmed that the wires went __somewhere__.
How does this get upvoted so heavily on Hacker News?
I mostly drive old 90s enthusiast cars, and I have had my fair share of undocumented switches.
The most surprising to date was in a Nissan Silvia, from 1989. Sometimes it wouldn't crank off the key, given the solution chosen it must have been a wiring issue. Instead of fixing that wiring, the previous owner had directly wired power to the starter via a "missle switch" style switch, and instead of mounting it anywhere remotely useful, it was just spliced into the loom and sat on top of the rocker cover in the engine bay.
So if it wouldn't start, I had to leave the key at "on", hop out of the car, bump that switch and then it would start. Obviously standing in front of a manual car while starting it is the dumbest thing next to wiring your starter to a switch in the engine bay. Fortunately I never ran myself over.
Another one, I will keep short, a 97 Skyline would only light up ready to start 1/4 times. Seemingly randomly, on key bump. Turns out the flash memory for the fuel map had corrupted, and depending on the temperature and a bit of randomness from the sensors, it would only hit a corrupted cell occasionally. It got worse and worse as more of the table corrupted, until it would only start say 1/60 key bumps.
It was a dodgy power wire causing the corruption, and fixing that plus reflashing the tune fixed the issue.
At first glance this reminded me of some Ford Crown Victoria Police Interceptor models which had similar unlabeled buttons. One would disable all exterior lights, including brake lights, for going into stealth/surveillance mode. An adjacent button was used to be able to remove the key and keep the engine running, while preventing the car from being shifted out of park until the key was inserted again. I haven't seen either feature re-introduced in the newer Explorers or Fusions though.
afh1 ·7 days ago
Apart from privacy concerns of your data being used or sold by the car vendor, government outreach is also a concern. There was a bill announced in the US for all new cars to be equipped with "driver impairment" tech which was called a "kill switch". Media rushed to say it's not really a kill switch, just "sensors or cameras to monitor the driver’s behaviors, head or eye movements" and "block the driver from operating the vehicle". So... a kill switch. https://apnews.com/article/fact-checking-402773429497
Anyway, I'm staying with my old gas Honda until it dies which is probably never with proper maintenance and eventually restoration. I'll never go electric. Modern cars are just smartphones on wheels at this point, and smartphones are just spying devices at this point.
Show replies
hoistbypetard ·7 days ago
That seems like the next-most-interesting question now that you've determined what the device is. Possibly followed closely by "can I use that free-to-me data in a fun way that might teach the people who installed the SIM to deactivate their devices when they sell them?"
i.e. Could you send and receive enough on the connection using that SIM to cost them enough money that they'd notice it?
Show replies
risenshinetech ·6 days ago
- Headline "My new car has a mysterious and undocumented switch".
No, this is not a new car. This is a used car. Finding undocumented switches in a vehicle someone else owned is very common. People modify their cars all the time. Finding an undocumented switch in a new car would be wild.
- "And that’s how the search comes to an end. After a bit of perseverance I figured out what it is."
You literally took your car to a dealership, and the mechanic told you what it was. This ENTIRE ARTICLE boils down to this statement. You did the bare minimum to investigate what it was: took the panel off and confirmed that the wires went __somewhere__.
How does this get upvoted so heavily on Hacker News?
Show replies
ehnto ·7 days ago
I mostly drive old 90s enthusiast cars, and I have had my fair share of undocumented switches.
The most surprising to date was in a Nissan Silvia, from 1989. Sometimes it wouldn't crank off the key, given the solution chosen it must have been a wiring issue. Instead of fixing that wiring, the previous owner had directly wired power to the starter via a "missle switch" style switch, and instead of mounting it anywhere remotely useful, it was just spliced into the loom and sat on top of the rocker cover in the engine bay.
So if it wouldn't start, I had to leave the key at "on", hop out of the car, bump that switch and then it would start. Obviously standing in front of a manual car while starting it is the dumbest thing next to wiring your starter to a switch in the engine bay. Fortunately I never ran myself over.
Another one, I will keep short, a 97 Skyline would only light up ready to start 1/4 times. Seemingly randomly, on key bump. Turns out the flash memory for the fuel map had corrupted, and depending on the temperature and a bit of randomness from the sensors, it would only hit a corrupted cell occasionally. It got worse and worse as more of the table corrupted, until it would only start say 1/60 key bumps.
It was a dodgy power wire causing the corruption, and fixing that plus reflashing the tune fixed the issue.
gr33nq ·7 days ago
Show replies