IFob: Keyless Entry

iFOB-11-M (Custom)

[Nate] hates keys. He’s gone through a lot of effort to remove them wherever possible. He has a keypad at home and a keypad at work, but he still has to carry car keys. His solution is to build a device he can carry in his pocket that will unlock the car via RF. To do this, he’s utilizing the guts of a Nike iPod puck along with an Arduino and an iPod serial board. He has managed to get this all working, but still has to carry his key to actually start the car. We know what his next project will be.

25 thoughts on “IFob: Keyless Entry

  1. unless some decent crypto with PKP is implemented this isn’t very wise. you can also use ‘rolling code’ which is what the most secure oem and aftermarket alarms are using now on top of passive transponder keys.

  2. I dont think he’s too worried about someone cloning that signal to get in his car… if I did the same on my car I wouldn’t worry a second about that.

    Cool project, was reading about it on sparkfun last night.

  3. Id love to do something like this, but im pretty sure it’d invalidate my insurance, and no one else would insure me!

    or i could just not tell them and when i crash or my car gets stolen, have the insurance invalidated by them finding out then, meaning no insurance pay out…..

  4. I have never seen a remote start setup that allowed you to drive the car without the key. I’m not saying that they don’t exist, but the way most of them work requires the key to be inserted anyway just to unlock the steering wheel and keep the car running.

  5. I second the idea that he just likes building things, which is perfectly acceptable.

    You can already cheaply buy purpose-built products that bypass the key and do both keyless entry and allow for keyless driving. They are easy to install, and actually cost less than an arduino.

    If it didn’t use one, however, we wouldn’t see it here on shillforarduino-A-Day, now would we?

  6. I don’t like keys either, but having to carry a small box doesn’t seem much better. If he had used an arduino with bluetooth he could then use his phone as the wireless “key”.

  7. Well, you don’t even need a fancy-brand car for dongle-unlock/starting anymore. My 2008 Nissan just has a button on the handle to open the car, and a button on the dash to start it. As long as you have the fob in your pocket, it just kinda works.

    I understand the DIY fun of something like this, but I would personally be way more interested in something that handled all my damn online passwords using a physical device. If only every auth-system supported something like SecurID…

  8. I’m working on a similar project… The hardest part in removing the key (at least in my car) from the picture is disabling the steering lock. It is mechanically actuated buy turning the key, not an electrical signal.

    I picked up a cheap rfid kit off ebay. They work well :)

  9. Honda started using passive transponder security in the 1995 prelude. the key turns, the ecm inits and powers the antenna around the lock cylinder, and the transponder in the key head does a response basically. It’s actually been working going on 3 decades as a solution because it was used in higher end cars before that; i think the corvette had them in the 80s as an option. the chip alone keeps the car from being cranked because the ecm which controls ignition, and fuel timing does a cryptographic challenge/response from the key that isn’t trivial cryptography.

  10. I’d like to correct myself. The ECM ASIC on most domestic manufactured cars use a static code in the passive transponder, the higher end cars use ‘rolling code’.

    Jet makes a unit that can create clones off a single key for any static code system which is a lot of makes. Also people often leave valet keys in the glove compartment. for ford they have a unit that can do a clone strait of the ecm interface.

    The best way for a static code solution is just get a RFID ASIC and make a reader with non-volatile memory to store keys. You just have to find the frequency and format the chip manufacturer is using. texas instrument’s are the only easy to find ones.

    Rolling code is the one that uses the crypto, and I think those are the ones that got fpga brute forced.

  11. I’ve been working on a similar system in my spare time, that uses RFID to unlock/open the door (shaved door handles soon upon success) and as the “physical” key. The physical lock for the steering wheel simply creates an electrical signal anyway, you just have to hack n slash a little further back. The ignition switch on my car has 6 pins which determine key position. So I just have the RFID reader transmit to those as outputs. Then I’ll route out the keyhole and where the ignition switch was to put in an engine start pushbutton. I’ll be making a site soon for all my car mods soon, once I get enough images and finished segments.

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