Toronto, Ontario — With seemingly little other option available to Kia and Hyundai drivers with vehicles already on the road, the pair of automakers have announced that a theft deterrent software is on the way to owners to address widespread reports of such vehicles being easy targets for thieves.
Spurred on largely by pressure from the U.S.’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), Kia and Hyundai plan to distribute a free software update to the vehicles of customers that will extend the vehicle’s alarm system from 30 seconds to one minute, as well as an update that will prevent the vehicle from being started without a key in the ignition.
This effort from the OEMs and federal safety regulator aims to combat an ongoing social media trend that challenges people to try and steal Kia or Hyundai vehicles—vehicles that have become infamous for the fact that many registered in the U.S. between 2015 and 2019 lacked any sort of anti-theft engine immobilizer.
Hyundai finally standardized immobilizers on its entire model lineup in 2021, and Kia is slowly working through its catalogue doing the same; not soon enough, however, to avoid an unofficial insurance blacklist on certain vehicles from the two OEMs in specific U.S. cities, due to their high theft rates.
Alongside the software updates, Hyundai and Kia will also be offering drivers an all-powerful, theft-deterring sticker that warns would-be thieves that the vehicle is equipped with an anti-theft system.
More details on the rollout of the software update, as well as how to get a sticker, are expected to come later on this month, according to the NHTSA.
