A gang of highly educated car thieves who hacked into computer systems using jammers and stole ‘keyless entry’ vehicles worth several million rupees has been nabbed in Lahore by the Anti-Vehicles Lifting Staff (AVLS).
Its ringleader Afnan Khan, a resident of Charsadda with a BS (Honors), admitted to developing jammers, tracker detectors, and vehicle software himself and mentioned that the gang found it opportune to steal vehicles between 2 AM and 5 AM.
Khan, with the help of his accomplices, was able to get full control of a vehicle within seven minutes. They would first turn their jammers on to jam all the electronic devices within an area of 300 meters, and would then smash the glass of the vehicle to get inside. They would also uninstall the original switch, replace it with the fake one, hack the computer system, and drive the car away using their own key.
The last obstacle for the thieves was the motorway where they would keep the stolen vehicle close behind the bumper of another vehicle and escape the toll plaza without being scanned.
SP AVLS Aftab Phularwan announced at a press conference that nine vehicles worth more than Rs. 33.6 million were recovered from the arrested suspects, Afnan Adil and Shehzad Masih.
He said that vehicles stolen from Lahore are sold in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa where there are warehouses and regular parking spaces for them.
While companies and car dealers present keyless entry or immobilizer systems as highly powerful car safety features as compared to the traditional unlocking systems, it is intriguing and frightening how easy it is for a graduate to hack the computers and immobilizer systems of such expensive vehicles that Pakistanis pay massive amounts for.
Via Geo
