Car Thieves Could Be Stopped Remotely
(遥远地) Speeding off (超速行驶) in a stolen car, the
thief thinks he has got a great catch. But he is in a nasty surprise. The car is
fitted with a remote immobilizer (使车辆不能调动的装置), and a radio signal from a control
center miles away will ensure that once the thief switches the engine 1 , he will not be able to start it again. For
now, such devices 2 only available for
fleets of trucks and specialist vehicles used on construction sites. But remote
immobilization technology could soon start to trickle (慢慢地移动) down to ordinary
cars, and 3 be available to ordinary
cars in the UK 4 two months. The idea
goes like this. A control box fitted to the car incorporates
5 miniature cellphone (移动电话，手机), a microprocessor and
memory, and a GPS satellite positioning receiver. 6
the car is stolen, a coded cellphone signal will tell the unit to
block the vehicle’s engine management system and prevent the engine 7 restarted. There are even plans for
immobilizers 8 shut down vehicles on
the move, though there are fears over the safety implications of such a system.
In the UK, an array of technical fixes is already making
9 harder for car thieves. "The pattern of vehicles crime
has changed", says Martyn Randall of Thatcham, a security research organization
based in Berkshire that is funded in part 10
the motor insurance industry. He says it would only take him a
few minutes to 11 a novice (初学者) how to
steal a car, using a bare minimum of tools. But only if the car is more than 10
years old. Modern cars are a far tougher (艰苦的) proposition (任务), as their engine
management computer will not 12 them to
start unless they receive a unique ID code beamed out by the ignition (点火) key.
In the UK, technologies like this 13 achieve a 31 percent drop in vehicle-related crime since 1997. But
determined criminals are still managing to find other ways to steal cars. Often
by getting hold of the owner’s keys in a burglary (夜窃行为；盗窃). In 2000, 12 percent
of vehicles stolen in the UK were taken using the owner’s keys double the
previous year’s figure. Remote-controlled immobilization system would 14 a major new obstacle in the criminal’s way by
making such thefts pointless. A group that includes Thatcham, the police,
insurance companies and security technology firms have developed standards for a
system that could go on the market sooner than the 15
expects.