Technology, *sigh*

Recently, we bought a Honda Odyssey minivan, the 2024 model. It is more or less fully loaded. Against our will. We prefer basic vehicles, with no bells and whistles, as we generally treat vehicles as tools to go from A to B. But, we could not get anything less belled-and-whistled (is there such a word?) than the one we bought as the dealer refused to sell the basic model. And even for this model, it was a take-it-or-leave-it kind of situation, as they told us people were lining up to buy it.

Fine. We bought it. We had to, as our old minivan was breaking down after almost 20 years of use. It was a basic model Toyota Siena. We bought it when they actually had a Lexus engine. So, it was powerful, quiet, fuel-efficient, the whole shebang. Now what? Well, learn how the thing operates! I don’t understand why there is a learning curve for driving a vehicle. But here it is, a bloody complicated thing. Unnecessarily so, in my opinion. But that is a different topic.

I only want to talk about one small aspect of this whole thing: the car key. You see, the car key has only one purpose. Originally. It unlocks your driving side car door for you. Perhaps the passenger side door as well. So, it is a security device. If you get a hold of a car key, why, you can get in the car and operate the car. As if it is yours. If it is not yours.

You protect the car key by making sure it is not physically taken away from you. That is it. Physical security.

This new vehicle we got, we have to protect the key by putting it in a Faraday cage. Yup, the security device now needs protecting. Can we have a key to the car key, so that we can use the key to switch on an off the car key?

This car key has become the vector to attack the security of the car it is supposed to provide security for.

How did we get into this absurd situation? Well, because car designers are idiots. Okay, that is too strong. Because whoever came up with this idea about remote controlling of vehicles did not think through the other side of technology. You see, there is no free lunch in the world. You want convenience? You have to sacrifice something to get it. So, in this case, you want to make sure the one thing you sacrifice is not the thing a car key is meant to provide. Choose something else to sacrifice. Is there a different thing you can sacrifice to design a car key that does not need to physically contact a vehicle to open and operate it? If not, perhaps technology is not needed for that? If so, do that instead.