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What's with Zipcar?
MrMrBen asks: "I've been seeing ads for Zipcar on the subway in NY. I didn't realize that it's actually out there and working. Apparently, you make a reservation on their web site, show up at the car, wave your membership card over the windshield and it unlocks for you. Does anyone know what kind of wireless network they use? Can they track the car while you're driving it? Have people been using zipcars, and what have their impression been? Is this the future of cars for city dwellers?"
I've been involved in the development of a similar project, which has not hit the market yet (and probably never will, due to other factors than technology). We didn't go for the "wave your card in from of the windshield" approach, but used SMS(!) for communication. Essentially, there was a GPS receiver and a GSM module in the car, and a box stuffed with our custom software.
:) To bad it never took off, but nice to hear that someone else got things through the non technical stumbling blocks of such a huge project...
The user made a booking on a website. When he was by the car, he sent an SMS to our server, which analyzed the SMS (for passphrase, phone number, correct car id etc), and if the SMS passed the tests an encrypted unlock request was sent to the car. Similar approach was used when locking the car.
The stuff was combined with GPS so, yes, we could keep track of the cars - but that info was SMS based too - we sen't a "please tell us your position" SMS to the car, which then replied with GPS coordinates. So, I guess that if you managed to unlock the car (which was non-trivial, you'd have to hack our encryption scheme and protocol - tricky but possible), and then trash the GSM module you'd be safe. OTOH, the cars we were using (or rather, supposed to use this with) were highly peculiar (as in they certainly stood out in a crowd) electric driven things that had a range of 90 km, so it wouldn't really do you much good.
It was a rather cool project, actually
May we live long and die out