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Wireless, GPS-Loaded 'Bait Car' Traps Thieves
captainClassLoader writes: "The Washington Post is reporting that a late-model car, loaded with wireless surveillance gear, a remote kill switch and GPS, is being left (unlocked, presumably) on the streets of the Washington, D.C. metro area as 'bait' for car thieves. This article reports that they've just made their first bust with the vehicle."
Minneapolis and a few other cities have had a similar program running very sucessfully here over the last 5 years. I believe a couple of the people who were busted even tried to use the entrapment defense, which was summarily shot down in the courts since no one made them steal the car, or even gave them the idea to.
All Mercedes models with the Tele Aid system (Similar to On*Star) installed have GPS hardware. You have to subscribe to have it activated, though. Once subscribed, you can call Mercedes and ask them to locate your car for you at any time for any reason (where's my wife?). As long as the car is on and visible to GPS, they can give you an approximate location. Location requests remain active for up to 14 days if they don't locate the car immediately. Location isn't really what Tele Aid is for, though.
Instead, Mercedes also promotes the LoJack Locator system. LoJack apparently has a better signal strength and doesn't rely on GPS, but rather on cellular triangulation. Many police departments have cars equipped with LoJack tracking systems as well. There's no subscription fee, just the purchase of the unit itself (around $600) which is covered for the life of the car. The only drawback is that you have to be in a covered area for it to work, so if the thief is smart and can get to the desert before you call the cops, you might be out of luck.
According to LoJack's website, approximately 25% of their recoveries result in an arrest. You also typically get a pretty good break on insurance, so the costs are somewhat offset.
The Mercedes Tele Aid system is designed primarily for driver convenience (Where am I? Where's my car? Can you tell me how to get to the nearest dealer/restaurant/gas station) while LoJack's sole purpose is post-theft vehicle recovery.
I suspect that the DC bait car is using something similar to LoJack - I believe there's an FCC band dedicated to law enforcement recovery type things.
Wow... I sounded like a commercial there, didn't I? I will say that LoJack does provide peace of mind and I was much more willing to spend $600 on it than $240/year for Tele Aid. It takes a darn good product for me to provide a recommendation - but if you've got a high-end or high-theft-risk car, LoJack is definitely worth the money.
Slashdot comments... splitting hairs since 1997.