You’d have thought that nobody can steal your Tesla thanks to its advanced tracking system. Thieves foolish enough to try to get away with it could be easily caught with the help of the on-board GPS. However, that’s not really the case. Tesla cars are incredibly valuable, which means thieves will do whatever it takes to grab one and leave no traces behind. In fact, at least two such thefts have already been reported in Europe.
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Two Tesla owners in Germany discovered that their Tesla Model S cars were stolen, Electrek reports. One of them is a brand new Tesla Model S P90D that was picked up on August 2nd, and another model disappeared on June 11th. Neither car has turned up yet, and it’s not clear how it happened or whether their owners will ever get them back.
It’s believed that hackers were able to breach the owners’ Tesla accounts and then use iPhone or Android apps to access and drive the cars away. One of the drivers said he still has the keys to the car.
They also had to jam the GPS signal on the cars, although it’s not clear how they did it.
Last year, a Model S was briefly stolen in Vancouver, but the owner was able to direct the police to the location of the car by using tracking data from his account.
It would certainly be interesting to hear how the thieves plan to use these stolen Teslas. Simply painting the cars over and changing their plates won’t suffice. To take advantage of Tesla’s features, you also have to use the car’s software. And we all know Tesla keeps track of what happens with each car, so it might be able to find these stolen vehicles if they ever reconnect to the system.
Tesla has yet to comment on the matter, but it’s likely that the company is looking at ways to retrieve the stolen cars, and prevent similar thefts in the future.
