My Audi A6 on the drive – and that’s where I’d like it stay. Despite having top level security features, prestige cars are still targeted by car thieves. But now they go for the keys, not forced entry

Business Car Manager: Editor’s Blog

AFTER four years at the top, perhaps it was inevitable that Audi would be nudged off the top of the car thieves’ most hated list.

Instead, fellow group brand VW has taken the top spot in the recent British Insurance Vehicle Security Awards (BIVSA) – see our news story Car thieves give VW a wide berth after Thatcham awards. But Audi is close behind: top in categories such as executive car (A4), open top (A5 Cabriolet), and compact 4×4 (Q5), and in the executive car category second (A6).

Which is gratifying news for me and my Audi A6. But you shouldn’t get lulled into a false sense of security, as I discovered from TRACKER, the vehicle tracking people.

The percentage of vehicles stolen using the owner’s actual keys – which are then recovered by the company – has gone up to 80% during the first quarter of 2010. It was 74% at the end of last year.

It rather suggests that car thieves have got the message. Cars are getting much more difficult to actually steal by traditional forced entry methods. So car thieves are taking a different route – direct to your keys.

Which is exactly what happened to a friend of mine. One night his Audi A6 (black like mine) was sitting on his drive; when he woke up it was gone. The thieves had broken into the house (they had actually removed a downstairs toilet window), found the keys, replaced the window, and then driven off. And all while my friend and his family slept quietly upstairs.

I called Stuart Chapman, TRACKER’s police relationship manager, about the BIVSA awards last week. Stuart confirmed the growing trend is for this sort of car theft experienced by my friend.

“The majority of stolen cars recovered by us are stolen using the owner’s key, through car-jacking, house burglary, or in public places,” Stuart explained.

“We are finding vehicles fitted with TRACKER en route or at the docks in shipping containers or HGV trailers. Thankfully, as we use VHF frequency, we can still get a signal to track these vehicles.” Which is reassuring news if you have such a unit fitted; less so if you don’t. And a reminder that you should never take security for granted, even if your car is a BIVSA winner.

So what additional precautions can you take?

Stuart suggested this advice for business car drivers:

Never leave the keys in the ignition, even if you are just stopping quickly; always lock and secure your vehicle; don’t leave belongings on show; don’t leave documents or spare keys inside the car; keep doors locked when driving; park in busy or well-lit and attended car parks near CCTV cameras; if you have a garage, use it for your car; and, perhaps crucially in light of what happened to my friend, don’t keep keys in a place where they can be seen or accessed from outside.