The next time you press your wireless key fob to unlock your car, if you find that it doesn’t beep until the second try, the issue may not be a technical glitch. Instead, a hacker like Samy Kamkar may be using a clever radio hack to intercept and record your wireless key’s command. And when that hacker walks up to your vehicle a few minutes, hours, or days later, it won’t even take those two button presses to get inside.

At the hacker conference DefCon in Las Vegas tomorrow, Kamkar plans to present the details of a gadget he’s developed called “RollJam.” The $32 radio device, smaller than a cell phone, is designed to defeat the “rolling codes” security used in not only most modern cars and trucks’ keyless entry systems, but also in their alarm systems and in modern garage door openers. The technique, long understood but easier than ever to pull off with Kamkar’s attack, lets an intruder break into cars without a trace, turn off their alarms, and effortlessly access garages.
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Read the article “Code-Cracking Gadget Lets Hackers Break into Your Car and Garage Without a Trace” on slate.com.