August 31st, 2005
Talk About a Keychain Drive: Mazda Replaces Keys with USB Drive
By Sean Fisher
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews
———-
Quick Alice Aside: We have come full circle. USB drives were first called “keychain drives” probably after the success of the Mobile Speedpass and those little mini grocery store ATM cards you could hang on your keychain instead of bulking your your wallet.. Problem was, with so much junk on the key ring, the USB keychain drive was quickly renamed the Thumbdrive in some circles. Today marks the day that you can have a keychain drive and actual car key all in one- talk about bizarrely useful. Just don’t try and charge your Blackberry in your USB -er ignition port.
———–
Who needs keys when you can start your car with a flash drive? One of Mazda’s newest prototypes does exactly that by replacing the traditional key-based ignition with a USB flash drive. Whats more, the drive also has the more conventional flash drive functionality of transferring files (such as music) to the car’s hard drive.
Mazda states that they are aiming for young, tech-savvy demographic here. It looks like they are betting that younger buyers will not be as attached to the more tradition type of car key that more experienced buyers are used to. As long as Mazda keeps the “Sassou” within the price range of younger car consumers, this could work not only in Asia, but possibly even North America as well. Source: Everything USB
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Lockergnome's Tech News Watch says:
Mazda Replaces Keys with USB Drive
By Sean Fisher, Contributing Writer, RealTechNews Who needs keys when you can start your car with a flash drive? One of Mazda’s newest prototypes does exactly that by replacing the traditional key-based ignition with a USB flash drive. What’s more, t…
August 31st, 2005 at 4:24 pm
nomechingues says:
these is amazing i want one they should call it the mazda shuffle
August 31st, 2005 at 5:43 pm
David Johnston says:
That’s really cool in my opinion, though I’ve had one USB drive go bad on me. Hopefully if they actually produce this, the USB key/drive thing will be tested thoroughly before being shipped out and made to take abuse. It still seems a little bit risky to me.
August 31st, 2005 at 5:59 pm
Jeremy Perkins says:
Honey - can you email my keys, I locked mine in the car.
September 1st, 2005 at 7:30 am
Some Guy says:
Farkers Unite!
September 1st, 2005 at 8:12 am
Alice says:
Mazda Shufffle is great! I like the idea of uplodaing video and music to my system while I drive, and this could be the key - literally!
September 1st, 2005 at 8:13 am
Some Farker says:
The first thing i thought of was the call to my boss: ” sorry sir, my Mazda caught a virus and stops every 30 seconds… I cant come in to work today”
September 1st, 2005 at 8:31 am
Alice says:
Some comments from Fark:
005-09-01 06:56:47 AM rikkards
They are mislabeling it (somewhat). What we have here is essentially a USB token although it sounds like they have enough memory on it to make it into a token/usb drive (tokens are normally only about 32k in storage). Normally they only are used for storing encryption certificates and don’t show up as a storage device. To get/receive information on it you need to provide a password although some are starting to support biometrics as well. The certificates are stored on the key by a password and the software normally doesn’t allow exporting certificates off of it, just importing. The caveat is normally, I guess someone could hack up a driver that may do it but I suspect they would have an easier time getting OpenOffice to produce flawless Word Documents. The great thing about doing this is if you lose your token, all they need to do is revoke your existing certificate and recover a new one onto a new token. Question is if they are using a Certificate Authority, how does the car find out if the new certificate is trusted?
Needless to say it is probably easier to steal the existing USB token than try to get the data off of it.
Now if they put a thumb reader on the USB key as well as using a cert….
=================
2005-09-01 04:21:48 AM EdgeRunner
“Hello, is this Honda’s tech support line? I accidentally copied over the info in my USB key with porn. Now when I plug it in, the car’s top comes off, the horn starts moaning, the headlights get so big they droop, and the engine revvs up really fast and then quits dead after about 10 minutes. Also, the key seems really loose in the slot now. Think you could stop giggling long enough to help me?”
===============
xalres
I can picture it now. I’m trying to escape a psycho killer, I’ve got a good 50 yard lead on him. I jump in my Mazda and stick the key in the ignition in a desp.
“Mazda has found new hardware. Would you like Mazda to search the internet for the hardware driver?”
“YES GODDAMMIT!”
……
“New hardware driver not found, would you like to search for it on your own?”
*slash* *stab* “AAAAAAAAAAAG!!”
“Unknown command, shutting down Mazda new hardware wizard. Have a nice day.”
Yeah, no thanks.
===============
September 1st, 2005 at 8:35 am
Lockergnome's Tech News Watch says:
Talk About a Keychain Drive: Mazda Replaces Keys with USB Drive
By Sean Fisher, Contributing Writer, RealTechNews ———- Quick Alice Aside: We have come full circle. USB drives were first called “keychain drives” probably after the success of the Mobile Speedpass and those little mini grocery store ATM cards you co…
September 1st, 2005 at 9:29 am
Thomas Henden says:
But do Mazda deliver it in an all electric version, preferably with the newer kind of Lithium Ion batteries?
Yes, someone could be worried about the limited range
of an electric car, however with Lithium Ion batteries,
such a small car like this would easily go 250-300km on
one charge, and it seems like it is focused at urban,
young people who more easily adapt to electric cars, than
older people.
Really hope that this car is offered in an electric version, as more hurricanes worldwide most probably will take out more oil platforms which gives even graver shortages of gasoline…
September 1st, 2005 at 1:09 pm
Don Honerbrink says:
How secure is it though? Replication would be pretty easy also I assume…
September 1st, 2005 at 1:41 pm
lazybratsche says:
Would you really want to replace the whole set of lithium ion batteries after a year of use or, say, 25,000 miles, whichever comes first? Consider that laptop batteries cost north of $50…
September 2nd, 2005 at 12:16 am
Erik says:
Does this mean of them little asian hackers could steal my stereo from the other side of the world? I mean, key fob only seems kinda sketchy– this opens up a whole new world of crime and potential there for. I think I’ll stick to my keys.
September 14th, 2005 at 9:08 am
Mark says:
Why not? German cars are now using laser cut keys which look more like a key drive than a norml key (no large metal part sticking out the end) Mercedes now has a bluetooth enable key which can stay in your pocket. You have only to tap the top of the shifter to start the car. Why not combine the two into a bluetooth enabled key drive?
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