Bluetooth smartphones are the new car key

Connected mobile phones can be detected by car systems accurately for secure vehicle access.

Forget key fobs and remote controls, now it is possible to unlock cars just by smartphones alone.

Just recently at Electronica 2018, R&D and innovation center Imec demoed that placing a mobile phone near a car can open the vehicle. The key techonologies to this were revealed to be Bluetooth LE and Imec's High Accuracy Distance Measurement (HADM) algorithms.

The new method is said to have an accuracy of 30cm or 10 times more than that of existing keyless entry techniques. Imec also made the technology resistant to relay attacks and location or distance spoofing.

If Imec successfully standardizes HADM via the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG), expect mobile phones to be the mainstream unlocking device for cars like how they have become common now as keys to smart door locks. This also means more partnerships between smartphone and automobile makers.

Bluetooth smartphones are not only the car keyless entry technology that's brewing up and becoming more advanced, though. Voice control is another new and hot way to access vehicles. This year and the previous one are when digital voice assistants for the home have started to become capable of unlocking cars and controlling their multimedia systems. Those voice assistants are either installed on mobile phones and smart home speakers.

Watch out for these two big trends in automotive keyless entry. Smarter and more secure cars are coming soon.