What are the odds of having your keyless car stolen by a relay (signal-amplification) attack?
Evidence quality 4.25/5
Eight-dimension review score against the quality rubric . Each dimension scored 1–5.
- D1 Source grounding
- 4/5
- D2 Source authority
- 4/5
- D3 Arithmetic
- 4/5
- D4 Uncertainty
- 4/5
- D5 Scope
- 4/5
- D6 Prose
- 5/5
- D7 Perception honesty
- 4/5
- D8 Caveat completeness
- 5/5
≈ As likely as
Perceived
No published survey measures fear of relay or signal-amplification car theft specifically. The closest signal is heavy UK news coverage and insurer marketing through 2024 and 2025 framing keyless cars as trivially stealable from the owner's driveway in under sixty seconds, alongside Home Office statements that more than one in four UK vehicles carry vulnerable keyless entry. Owners of keyless premium models in UK cities express the sharpest worry; some Range Rover variants became hard to insure in London. The intuition most owners hold is that a keyless car parked outside overnight is at appreciable, recurring risk of electronic theft, with the fear concentrated in the UK and continental Europe rather than the US.
Rough estimate: Many UK keyless-car owners intuit something like a 1-in-10 chance over the life of the car
Source: editorial intuition, not polled
Actual
~0.65% of keyless UK vehicles per year (electronic theft, relay-led)
Keyless-entry vehicles in the UK
Show derivation
Subgroup: a UK resident who owns a keyless-entry vehicle, over a ~12-year ownership horizon (matching the UK average vehicle age). The UK records roughly 130,000 vehicle thefts a year (RUSI reports 136,396 across the UK in 2022-23; secondary summaries of ONS police-recorded data cite ~121,825 for England and Wales in the year ending March 2025 — that specific count was not confirmed on a primary ONS page and is treated as approximate). Of whole-vehicle thefts, the ONS Crime Survey attributes roughly half to manipulating the key-fob signal: 57.6% in 2023-24, falling to 46.7% in 2024-25; take ~50%, giving ~65,000 electronic (relay-led) thefts a year. The Home Office estimates over 27% of UK vehicles have vulnerable keyless entry; against a vehicle base of roughly 36 million that is ~10 million keyless vehicles. Annual per-keyless-vehicle electronic-theft rate ~= 65,000 / 10,000,000 = 0.0065. Compounded over 12 years: 1 - (1 - 0.0065)^12 = 0.075, about 1 in 13. log10(0.075) = -1.12. Bands are wide because the CSEW method-share is victim-reported (owners often cannot say how the car was taken) and swings ~11 points year-to-year, and because relay is the lead method within a broader electronic-theft category that also includes CAN-injection and key cloning.
Caveats: covered_in_prose
covered_in_prose
How the risk varies
The headline figure averages across very different situations. Here’s how the probability varies by scenario or context:
1 in 13 · 7.5%
The heartland. ONS CSEW attributes roughly half of whole-vehicle thefts to key-fob signal manipulation (57.6% in 2023-24), up from 13% in 2018-19, against a fleet where the Home Office says over 27% of vehicles have vulnerable keyless entry. The ~1-in-13 central estimate is the UK keyless-owner figure.
1 in 17 · 6.0%
Broadly comparable exposure. ADAC testing found the overwhelming majority of keyless models sold in Europe defeatable by relay amplification (230 of 237 models in one widely-cited test). Underlying national theft rates vary, so the figure is approximate and somewhat below the UK; no single EU-wide per-keyless-vehicle relay rate is published.
1 in 125
Far lower and poorly tracked. NICB and FBI UCR do not break vehicle theft out by relay method; the 2022-2024 US theft spike was driven by the Kia/Hyundai immobilizer exploit (a physical-key vector), not relay attacks. Relay theft occurs but is a small, unmeasured share, so this is an order-of-magnitude placeholder, not a measured rate.
Bar length and shade rank these scenarios against each other, not against other risks. The exact odds are shown beside each.
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Across the UK, roughly 130,000 vehicles are stolen each year, and the Office for National Statistics’ Crime Survey now attributes about half of whole-vehicle thefts to manipulating the key fob’s signal. That share was 13% in 2018-19 and reached 58% by 2023-24 before easing to 47% the following year. Set against a fleet in which the Home Office estimates more than one in four vehicles carry vulnerable keyless entry, the annual rate works out to roughly 0.65% of keyless cars, or about 1 in 13 over a twelve-year ownership life. That places relay theft above the lifetime odds of a stroke and well above the all-method US vehicle-theft figure, though still an order of magnitude below the lifetime chance of a home burglary.
The mechanism is what makes the number unusual. A pair of operators with a signal repeater stand one near the house and one by the car; the device extends the fob’s range so the car believes its key is present, and the whole sequence runs in under a minute with no forced entry and no alarm. ADAC’s testing in Germany found the technique defeated the overwhelming majority of keyless models, 230 of 237 in one run, across every price tier. The vulnerability is in the design of passive entry itself, not in a single manufacturer’s mistake, which is why the UK figure has climbed in step with the spread of keyless cars rather than tracking any one model.
The estimate is a UK keyless-owner number and travels poorly. In the US, the 2022-2024 theft surge ran on the Kia and Hyundai ignition exploit, a physical-key vector, and neither NICB nor the FBI breaks theft out by relay method, so the American figure is far lower and effectively unmeasured. Within the subgroup the spread is also wide: the survey data are victim-reported, owners often cannot say how their car went, and the year-to-year method share swings by ten points. A late-model car with a motion-sensing or ultra-wideband fob that ignores an amplified signal sits at the low end of the band; an older keyless car left on a driveway with the fob by the front door sits at the high end. The band from 1 in 33 to 1 in 7 reflects that the headline is a moving target, not a settled rate.
Related tidbits
About 0.65% of keyless UK vehicles are taken electronically each year, which compounds to roughly 1 in 13 over a typical 12 years of ownership. Far from the rare gadget-crime it sounds like.
Claim ledger
Every number below is what each source reported, with the verbatim quote we relied on and how we arrived at our figure. Click any link to verify directly.
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[1] Office for National Statistics — Crime in England and Wales: year ending March 2025
Crime in England and Wales: year ending March 2025- Statistic
Police recorded vehicle offences fell 8% to 350,070 in the year ending March 2025- Excerpt
“Police recorded vehicle offences decreased by 8% (to 350,070 offences) during the same period.”
- Source data from
- 2025-07-24
- Accessed
- 2026-06-13
- Calculation
- Establishes the scale and direction of UK vehicle crime from the authoritative national statistician. 'Vehicle offences' is broader than theft of a vehicle (it includes theft from vehicles and interference), so this figure is used to anchor order of magnitude, not as the theft numerator directly. The theft-of-vehicle subtotal (~120,000-136,000/yr) is taken from RUSI and secondary ONS summaries.
- Independence
- ONS police-recorded crime is independent of the insurer (Tracker, ABI) and think-tank (RUSI) sources used elsewhere in this entry.
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[2] Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) — Combatting Vehicle Theft in the UK: Strategies Against Organised Crime
Combatting Vehicle Theft in the UK: Strategies Against Organised Crime- Statistic
Over 80% increase in vehicles stolen in England and Wales from 2013 to 2023; RUSI identifies relay attacks and CAN-injection as primary methods- Excerpt
“an increase of over 80% in the number of vehicles stolen in England and Wales from 2013 to 2023”
- Source data from
- 2025-06-01
- Accessed
- 2026-06-13
- Calculation
- RUSI's June 2025 work documents the reversal of two decades of declining UK vehicle theft and identifies relay/signal-amplification and CAN-injection as the lead methods. The RUSI report itself frames keyless attacks as a primary method; the skeptical reading (that the evidence for the extent of keyless taking is weak) comes from an independent commentary, not from RUSI. The total-thefts figure of 136,396 for 2022-23 and the rate of 4.42 per 1,000 cars are cited in secondary summaries of the RUSI paper and were not confirmed on a RUSI-hosted page, so they are treated as approximate in the normalization.
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[3] Police Life (reporting Tracker UK data) — Legislation Must Be Enforced As Keyless Thefts Soar — Tracker Reaches 15-Year High in Stolen Vehicle Recovery
Legislation Must Be Enforced As Keyless Thefts Soar — Tracker Reaches 15-Year High in Stolen Vehicle Recovery- Statistic
93% of vehicles recovered by Tracker were taken without the keys; over £35m of vehicles recovered Jan-Oct 2025, a 15-year high- Excerpt
“93% of the vehicles recovered by Tracker, the stolen vehicle recovery (SVR) expert, were taken without the keys”
- Source data from
- 2025-11-29
- Accessed
- 2026-06-13
- Calculation
- Tracker's recovery data confirm that keyless/electronic methods dominate UK whole-vehicle theft. 'Without the keys' is broader than relay specifically (it also captures CAN-injection and cloning), so it supports the electronic-theft category that frames this entry rather than isolating the relay share. Tracker recoveries are a biased sample (only tracked, mostly higher-value vehicles), so the 93% is an upper-bound indicator of the keyless share, not the population rate.
- Independence
- Tracker is a commercial recovery firm; figure is corroborated directionally by the ONS CSEW method-share and is independent of the ONS and RUSI sources.
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[4] Nation.Cymru (analysis of ONS data by RTA Law) — Car key hacking cases quadruple in Wales and England
Car key hacking cases quadruple in Wales and England- Statistic
Share of car thefts via key-fob signal manipulation rose from 13% (Apr 2018-Mar 2019) to 58% (Apr 2023-Mar 2024) per ONS CSEW- Excerpt
“from Apr 2018 to Mar 2019, only 13% of thefts were committed this way – but this skyrocketed to 58% from Apr 2023 to Mar 2024”
- Source data from
- 2025-01-20
- Accessed
- 2026-06-13
- Calculation
- Provides the electronic-theft method-share used in the numerator. The 58% (2023-24) figure is consistent with the 57.6% whole-vehicle figure that fell to 46.7% in 2024-25 in later CSEW tables; ~50% is used centrally. The underlying data are ONS Crime Survey (victim-reported), which is why method attribution carries error and the uncertainty band is wide.
- Independence
- Reports a third-party (RTA Law) analysis of the underlying ONS CSEW dataset; the trend is the ONS survey's, not the news outlet's.
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[5] Auto Express (reporting ADAC / Which? testing) — Almost all keyless car systems vulnerable to relay attacks
Almost all keyless car systems vulnerable to relay attacks- Statistic
Of 237 keyless car models ADAC tested, 230 were vulnerable to relay attacks; only 3 (all Jaguar Land Rover) fully resisted- Excerpt
“230 were vulnerable to relay attacks ... Only 3 models achieved full resistance to keyless attacks (all Jaguar Land Rover vehicles)”
- Source data from
- 2024-01-01
- Accessed
- 2026-06-13
- Calculation
- Supports the EU/Europe regional row: relay vulnerability is near-universal across the keyless fleet, independent of brand tier. ADAC's own time-series shows slow improvement (e.g. 44 of 616 models protected by August 2023), but the protected share has stayed in the single-digit percentages. This is a vulnerability count, not a theft rate, and is used qualitatively in the regional breakdown, not in the numerator. The 2024 date is approximate to the Auto Express report; ADAC updates the test continuously.
- Independence
- ADAC (German motoring club) testing, reported via Auto Express and corroborated by Which?; independent of the UK crime statistics.