atartan

Yes, It is just the housing , probably they are using the battery of the speaker.. The chip they are using is under £5. The interesting thing is they say this security issue could be fixed by a software upgrade. I wonder if any car company would make investment to fix the software for the sold cars.

Not sure if this was posted here before but this is a very interesting read https://kentindell.github.io/2023/04/03/can-injection/. A JBL portable speaker is used for stealing RAV4s ...

I though about what would happen if I hadnt recovered the car myself.. There is a possibility that Police might have found the car after reporting stolen.. The car would be returned to me but it would be recorded as stolen... Value of the car would have dropped significantly then (as it will show up in the searches). In my opinion.. I dont think There is a correct action once the car stolen. I have watched few documentaries about car theft.. I think the main reason of the rise of car theft is .. There is no real punishment... Even if police catch the criminals.. Community sentence.. For stealing 50K car.. They get to clean a toilet or cut grass in a park...

Thank you for asking. It has been really awful to deal with the insurance company. it took insurance 4 months to get the car fixed . Their garage couldn't fix the issue and they had to send it to Toyota garage. It was only GPS not showing the correct location, they finally managed to fix it. I was told that the claim was around £7000 because of the courtesy car etc... They hire a car from "Enterprise rent a car" as a courtesy car. I complained to financial ombudsman as 4 months wasn't acceptable but they told me 4 months is Ok to fix a GPS antenna connector. They told me I had the 3 door small courtesy car .... I was paying for no-claim protection but as expected, my insurance premium went up and I had to pay the insurance excess for the claim. It might have been cheaper and faster if I paid things from my own pocket. I am really annoyed how easy to steal RAV4 but I decided to keep the car. I use the steering wheel lock (disklok ) even if I park it for 10 mins, annoying but I hope it will keep the lowlifes away

this is what happens if you drive with no petrol.. https://www.youtube.com/embed/0s40xNqudDg

Funny thing is , I already have a Gap insurance. I should say it was my naivety that I went after my own car. I was just so p..ed off

Police told me that it won't go to in stolen & recovered database because I found the car. It is just considered at criminal damage.

I am told my car has been fixed and it will be returned to me soon. After nearly 4 months, Toyota managed to fix the car.. Well done Toyota. "Their exact wording is "it is difficult to fix electrical problems "...... I asked what parts changed, They told me They have changed the headunit and some wiring loop. When I asked if they change the head-unit, why MyT app is showing the old head-unit device ID and how they managed to enter my user credential to new head-unit..... The guy says your car is fixed "whats the issue now".... If I was paying this from my pocket, The conversation would be much longer... Lesson learnt, if my car is stolen again, I wouldn never try to recover.. Let my insurance to pay for a new car, quicker and less hassle.

I see that there is a fuse for central locking system, Does this mean the car will not be unlocked without a physical Key inserted to unlock the door? or any other fuse that would disable the socket for headlight ? Just trying to see if there is anyway to add a switch for one of the fuses... trying to make these scumbags work a bit more difficult. I have seen battery kill switches wireless/bluetooth controlled but I assume the car would lose all the settings once battery is disconnected, not ideal for every day use.

I have asked several times when the car would be fixed but the answer is "as long as it takes". I contacted insurance's complaint department and They told me that there is no legal limit that they need the fix the car. Their excuse is shortage of parts . I will take this to financial ombudsman but I am told I have to wait 8 weeks after my complaint with the insurer and only 4 week has passed since I complained. I initially had some faith that they would fix the car ... I would have complained earlier otherwise.

My car was same, If they drove the car somewhere else I wouldn't be able to find it. The insurance had the car for 2 months and they couldn't fix the GPS and They had to send it to Toyota. It has been 3 months since the insurance took my car for repairs. They said that the parts might take another 2 months to arrive. They are still not sure if they will be able to fix it though. I wonder if they would write off the car since They cant repair !

Rob must be Toyota's car the expert for calming stolen car owners..... He replied my email as well when I contacted Toyota UK 3 months ago........ Thanks for contacting Toyota. I am sorry your RAV4 has been stolen, I can imagine this must have been a very upsetting and distressing experience. Your custom is important to us and we appreciate the investment you have made in our brand. Your vehicle has a number of theft deterrent devices; an immobiliser, intrusion alarm, motion sensor alarm and tilt detection sensors. Unfortunately, new theft methods and tools are continuously being developed by organised criminal gangs to gain access to - or steal the latest vehicles. This is a challenge the entire automotive industry is facing. We are continuously striving to improve our vehicles and whilst, regrettably we cannot guarantee that these efforts will eliminate all criminal activity and theft, our design team will continue to work with the police and insurers to develop technology and components to try to prevent vehicle crime. Kind regards Rob Rob Cameron

There is another video footage on the first page of this post. It took more or less the same time to steal RAV4. Whether it is 1 minute or 5, It is clearly not difficult to open the doors and start the car without the key.

I would say this post and videos are informing people about how easy to steal these cars.I am sure many here on this forum purchased additional security devices after seeing the posts.. which makes the job difficult for the thieves . I have no knowledge of device being used to steal these cars and it is not described in any of the posts here. I dont know how someone would figure out how to steal a car by just looking at 1 min video

I've started seeing more posts on facebook groups now, People reporting their RAV4 stolen. rav4-stolen.mp4