Turning Bluetooth off - am I being paranoid...

[Vostok]

I was curious on the weekend to test if I could open my car doors when the phone App shows the key is “connected” but the phone was not on my person. While I did only one test, with the phone about 5m away but connected, I could not open the doors (the screen inside advised me to use my key card).

Yesterday I was at a place where I realised my car was parked just on the other side of a timber wall, but with no windows, I had no visibility of it. App said my key was connected. I turned Bluetooth off to prevent any risk that someone could just walk up to the car and open the doors, and potentially drive it away, because I don’t now how physically close the phone needs to be to the car for doors to be openable (and radio is a bit random anyway - sometimes I have walked more than 20m away from my car before it decided to lock itself).

Paranoid?

 

[Zsik3115]

Just manually lock. Easy

 

[Grenadine]

Does model 3 have a pin to drive option?

 

[strykeroz]

Just manually lock. Easy

It's not clear from the user manual that manually locking the car overrides the Walk Away Door Lock unlocking the car when in range. Is that confirmed by your experience?

 

[mswlogo]

Totally overkill. Don't you think Tesla is smarter than that?

You will see Multiple Connections in your bluetooth connections.
You will see them come and go at you walk around the car and move away.

It triangulates your exact position and is very fussy that you must be close to the vehicle to unlock.
In fact some complaints that it won't unlock is because their phone is in their back pocket instead of in front pocket.

 

[PC__LoadLetter]

Totally overkill. Don't you think Tesla is smarter than that?

You will see Multiple Connections in your bluetooth connections.
You will see them come and go at you walk around the car and move away.

It triangulates your exact position and is very fussy that you must be close to the vehicle to unlock.
In fact some complaints that it won't unlock is because their phone is in their back pocket instead of in front pocket.

Phantom load? I suppose if you charge at home and the car is plugged in, it makes no difference. But for those of us who live in flats...

 

[mswlogo]

Phantom load? I suppose if you charge at home and the car is plugged in, it makes no difference. But for those of us who live in flats...

You mean Phantom Drain, nah. Don't worry about it. They are Bluetooth LE, like Beacons.
They make Bluetooth LE Beacons the size of quarter that run like a year on a battery the size of nickel.

https://www.amazon.com/FeasyBeacon-Bluetooth-Proximity-Eddystone-programmable/dp/B077FQ6HLV

It could even be your phone (Tesla App running in background) that is doing the triangulation work.
It's all very low power stuff and running if your near the car or not.

I could see the BLE devices always on my phone in my house and my Model 3 had very low phantom drain (1-2 miles every 2 days).

 

[WilburGreen]

Ive got PIN to drive set on my M3. So no matter if someone did get my phone they cant drive the car.

 

[mswlogo]

Ive got PIN to drive set on my M3. So no matter if someone did get my phone they cant drive the car.

I rather them take the car than beat the PIN out of me

 

[WilburGreen]

I rather them take the car than beat the PIN out of me

My hope is i will have run a long way before they get to the pin screen.

 

[Vostok]

Just manually lock. Easy

I fail to see why that would work, because provided your car thinks your phone is close enough to it (whatever that distance is), it can be unlocked. Otherwise, how would you unlock it after manually locking?

 

[Vostok]

Totally overkill. Don't you think Tesla is smarter than that? You will see Multiple Connections in your bluetooth connections. You will see them come and go at you walk around the car and move away. It triangulates your exact position and is very fussy that you must be close to the vehicle to unlock.
In fact some complaints that it won't unlock is because their phone is in their back pocket instead of in front pocket.

I did some tests this evening and it turns out my paranoia is justified. The car can be unlocked with my phone (iPhoneX) on the other side of a timber partition wall about 4 metres away from drivers’ door. This basically replicates the situation I was in on Tuesday. Someone could have opened the door and driven away, and being totally silent, I would not have heard it

Looking at the list of Bluetooth connected devices, there needs to be a device with a random 18-alphanumeric ID connected for this to work, although merely being connected is not enough. Moving the phone 5 metres away, with this ID still showing as connected, turned out to be far a enough away that the car door could not be opened, with the console screen instead advising to use the key card.

Another situation where this could have ended in tears - in January I stayed in a timber rental house with my Model 3 parked in the driveway immediately adjacent to the bedroom and I slept on the side closest to the car with my phone on the bedside table. Almost certainly my phone would have been close enough to remain connected and the car to be openable.

In any similar situation in future I will turn Bluetooth off to remove the risk.

 

[Moskito]

Vostok,
If I walk away from my car, it might be 20 metres until it locks.
But if my wife walks away, the car locks within a few metres.
Weird
Same iPhone models, 6
And it’s the same whether in our garage or an open car park.
I always look while walking away to make sure it locks, it always locks.

 

[mswlogo]

You do need to walk far enough away for it to lock and you’ll hear the confirmation that it did lock. Once locked you need to be very close to unlock.

 

[miimura]

You are not paranoid. There are random cases where the car will unlock with a phone key nearby when it shouldn't. However, the car is more stringent about the phone key triangulation to actually start the car. PIN to drive would be a stronger safety net though, albeit more annoying on a daily basis.

 

[Anubis]

In any similar situation in future I will turn Bluetooth off to remove the risk.

Turn PIN to drive on, it's easier and automatic. I keep nothing I care about in the car a thief can steal.

Even if the car was stolen without the card or phone, they can only drive it until they stop.
There was a case in Sydney recently where this happened and the car was "parked" 5 KM's away from its home because the thief stopped and couldn't start it again.Then use your app to see where it is and call the police.
Not ideal....

 

[Vostok]

You do need to walk far enough away for it to lock and you’ll hear the confirmation that it did lock. Once locked you need to be very close to unlock.

Well that was not the case with my test last night. Car was locked, I walked far enough away into my house for the phone key to show as disconnected. I then progressively placed my phone closer and closer to the garage, then going to my car to see if I could unlock it, until I could unlock it without the phone in my presence and the phone being on the other side of the garage wall. The distance was about 4 metres.

 

[Vostok]

PIN to drive would be a stronger safety net though, albeit more annoying on a daily basis.

Turning off Bluetooth in the relatively small number of cases where this is a risk I think is less annoying. Takes a second to do and then I have complete peace of mind that no-one can open the doors. To me PIN to drive is a second line of defence if the first (unauthorised access) is somehow breached. I want to stop that first.

 

[Vostok]

I keep nothing I care about in the car a thief can steal.

Same here, but I don’t want strangers in my car even if they do nothing but admire the interior.

 

[Flatbat]

You are not paranoid. There are random cases where the car will unlock with a phone key nearby when it shouldn't. However, the car is more stringent about the phone key triangulation to actually start the car. ...

Can you give an example of when the car shouldn’t unlock with the phone key nearby?
As I understand it, a signal strength threshold must be met by just 1 of the 4 BLE endpoints to consider the phone key present. I have not read anything from Tesla to say triangulation between multiple endpoints has anything to do with it. If the signal strength threshold is met by a single endpoint and the device is authenticated, the car should unlock once a door handle is pulled.