SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Many customers at a small town grocery store in Alberta had trouble unlocking their cars, while others had their car alarms going off mysteriously, since early January. According to the CBC, after trial-and-error of turning off electricity to nearby buildings and calling in the federal government for assistance, the source of the interference has been traced back to "faulty consumer electronic equipment stuck in transmit mode".
The story of the original mystery can be found here.
Key fobs that suddenly won't unlock vehicles. Cars that won't start. Alarms that go off for no reason and can't be quieted. Something mysterious is thwarting drivers outside a grocery store in the small Alberta town of Carstairs — and it's sparking all kinds of theories.
The problems have been happening for weeks in the parking lot outside the Westview Co-op grocery store in Carstairs, a town of about 4,000 about 60 kilometres north of Calgary.
[Ed. note: key fob: A passive wireless electronic device that usually uses RFID technology to control access to buildings, containers, computers, etc. by being placed near a detector.
Remote keyless system (RKS):
Widely used in automobiles, an RKS performs the functions of a standard car key without physical contact. When within a few yards of the car, pressing a button on the remote can lock or unlock the doors, and may perform other functions. A remote keyless system can include both a remote keyless entry system (RKE), which unlocks the doors, and a remote keyless ignition system (RKI), which starts the engine.
Updated: 20190202_131403 UTC]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 02 2019, @02:04PM (4 children)
Microwave ovens disrupt 802.11 wireless, Those old analog AM car radios will disrupt reception on a nearby cars radio, A CB with a 100 Watt linear amp will disrupt TV'S, radios, and burglar alarms for about a 1 block radius. Bad spark plug wires do the same. Heck... I used to daisy chain small charged capacitors and watch TV's wig out after shorting the leads.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Snotnose on Saturday February 02 2019, @02:15PM (2 children)
As will a 3' tall tesla coil fed via a 15 kv neon sign transformer. Think I got the instructions from a 60's era Popular Electronics.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 02 2019, @10:26PM
ISBN 0-8306-0604-1
Back in the day I built several of the projects in it. They are surprisingly simple for what they can do. I still have a bunch of high Kv diodes out in the workshop somewhere.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 03 2019, @03:12PM
I cant tell you how awesome that is on a car. It can cause some serious damage to the car feeding it as well as stuff nearby that can then arc back to the car, though, but that can make it more awesome if done on purpose for the sake of science and art. or at least using those as the reason to just watch stuff get zapped before it breaks itself.
(Score: 1) by Rupert Pupnick on Sunday February 03 2019, @12:16AM
A bad story that doesn’t give the root cause even though it’s known by investigators. Probably the offending device was transmitting on the wrong frequency (where the receiver was listening).