Garmin Lock?

Good investigative work.

How do they know where you live if your Garmin is locked? They are not using the Garmin to navigate there, because it is locked.

The next logical place for a security location is a spot you pass on the way to your house. Would a thief would pass that spot also? Probably

The perfect spot would be behind your house if your land stretches at least 200 feet back. I suppose we could reason that thieves would get wise to that one, but is it worth the risk?

All good points, but I do think we give too much warm personal thought and consideration to thieves. They are not like us, they are cold thoughtless, scared, and gone in 60 seconds.

The Garmin itself would have to navigate them to your security location, (house) which would be a serious oversight in the design.

but more importantly, I also like the splash screen idea. Mine is a picture of me in the transporter of the Enterprise. I chose it because I've learned that a GPS isn't just a device to get you from point A to point B, it actually expands your world. So everytime I turn it on I smile.

I still maybe out my GPS but nobody else gets it.

Its important to me that bilson and everyone else use Garmin lock. That way the thieves may learn that Garmin gps units are locked and be less inclined to risk stealing them. So your using Garmin lock protects my unit. As for myself, it is indeed too much trouble, I activated it and then deactivated it a few days later. Oh yea, I never leave it in the car as well.

The Garmin doesn't navigate thieves to your door. They have your address by riffling through your glove box which has repair receipts, maybe owners card or insurance card. Your car is more likely to be broken in while in or near the driveway.

I wish the Garmin lock feature required either

1) 5 digits

- OR -

2) User setable Timeout Period (say 5 minutes to 24 hours) after a user setable number of failed attempts ...

That way I can choose 5 minutes or 24 hours AFTER 2 to 50 attempts or whatever...unguessable

It would drive any thought of trying to unlock by random guess out of the question and I believe reduce the value of the theft once the news gets out. Unfortunately, theives rarely keep up with recent news so it would take quite a while for this to get around. Also, it is impossible to reason with a thief who steals first and asks questions - if ever - later.

I prefer your number two option actually, just stop em cold period. but you have to be careful not to get stopped as well!

I guess Garmin figures their current lock is beyond the common thief's thought patterns.

I would think 5 minutes be plenty... hmmm two guesses wait 5 minutes, two more guesses wait 5 minutes.

After awhile the thieve will go looking for a tomtom, oops, sorry tomtom owners.

I like the idea of the time out feature. I wish Garmin would use the suggestions on this site.

I'm ordering mine now! Thanks.

I would have to agree on the sensitive address thought. I wouldn't want my family and friend addresses stolen with the device.

And of course they wouldn't be able to use my Red Light Camera POI file either

--Just lock it!--

-Amen-

Would you have a safe in the house and not lock it or lock it with the combination taped to the door??? Common sense dictates if you can lock something there must be a reason....

I have a file cabinet with a lock on it, but I don't bother to keep it locked. Too much trouble, Too little to protect.

I tried the lock when I first got my nuvi. Real pain to punch in the code each time. Screen seemed to have more than reasonable problems getting the right buttons detected. I never leave my GPS in the car anyway, it leaves when I do. Sure, someone might break into my house and take it (at least I don't keep it in my unlocked file cabinet), but for me locking it is more of a nuance to myself than any satisfaction I may get from discovering it stolen and realizing a thief may have problems getting past the simple, try as many times as you want "lock". My nuvi would still be gone.

both of my nuvis are locked i think its a good thing that you turn the lock on with 4 different numbers its would take days to do it and most people that take thing like that want to unload it quick so they will just tos it

nuvi 5000 and nuvi 200w

To each his own....good luck...

I lock my safe and leave the key in it. The objective of the safe is to protect the contents in case of a fire. That contents would have little street value.

Back in the 70s it was easy to open a locked car door. You could slide a simple tool inside the door in front of the window and pop the lock open. Today manufactures have secured car doors, so the thieves use a $5 punch tool to break the window out. Locked, or unlocked, you lost a $300 GPS and have a $300 window to replace. The thief is gone, and not coming back.

The addresses in my GPS are listed in the phone book anyhow. I'm just your every day citizen with your every day friends and every day family. What do I think I have to hide? My address is on the mail box, the street name is on a sign on the corner and the zipcode and city are posted at the post office. Take that information to city hall, and you can see what I paid in property taxes last year.

I've been using the Garmin lock for the last little while, and I can say that I don't find it too inconvenient, so it is definitely worth the while, this is on top of other precautions, like not leaving it in the car.

That's the main thing. I've never lost a cell phone, and never had one stolen in the 19 years or so that I've carried one. That's because I don't leave it laying around in the truck and at the beach.

I talked to someone last week who had their GPS stolen. They made the mistake of leaving it in the car all day.

Actually, now that I think about it, I did lose my first cell phone. I just don't remember much about it because that was back in 1990. I think it fell out of my coat pocket while getting into my car, and was run over by another car. Some nice lady returned it, but I had to get a new one because it was smashed.

anyone know how security works in those with blinking red lights? does it go off if a door is forced to open or a window breaks?

mine doesnt have a red blinker (i drive a corolla) so i dont know how easy itd be to take anything from my car.

Been a couple of years since I was an auto tech so I lost track of all of them lately (and can't comment about Toyota) but the flashing red lights in vehicles can mean anything from nothing (add-ons!) to disabled ignition & starters, to alarm if door or hood opens, to sometimes on high end vehicles also untrasonic glass breakage detection.

All of that varies widely from mfr. to mfr., within that model to model, and then year to year.

Sorry to be so vague, but you really need to check your owner's manual and/or search the net for your Make, Model, and Year!

I just got this in an email and thought I would share. It confirms what we have been talking about.

This gives us something to think about with all our new electronic technology.

GPS
A couple of weeks ago a friend told me that someone she knew had their car broken into while they were at a football match. Their car was parked on the green which was adjacent to the football stadium and specially allotted to football fans. Things
stolen from the car included a garage door remote control, some money and a GPS which had been prominently mounted on the dashboard.

When the victims got home, they found that their house had been ransacked and just about everything worth anything had been stolen.

The thieves had used the GPS to guide them to the house. They then used the garage remote control to open the garage door and gain entry to the house. The thieves knew the owners were at the football game, they knew what time the game was scheduled to
finish and so they knew how much time they had to clef an up the house. It would appear that they had brought a truck to empty the house of its contents.

MOBILE PHONE
I never thought of this.......
This lady has now changed her habit of how she
lists her names on her mobile phone after her handbag was stolen. Her handbag, which contained her cell phone, credit card, wallet... etc... Was stolen.

20 minutes later when she called her hubby, from a
pay phone telling him what had happened, hubby says 'I received your text Asking about our Pin number and I've replied a little while ago.'

When they rushed down to the bank, the bank staff
told them all the money was already withdrawn. The thief had actually used the stolen cell phone to text 'hubby' in the contact list and got hold of the pin number Within 20 minutes he had withdrawn all the money from their bank account.

Moral of the lesson:
Do not disclose the relationship between you and
the people in your contact list. Avoid using names like Home, Honey, Hubby, Sweetheart, Dad, Mom, etc.... And very importantly, when sensitive info is being asked through texts, CONFIRM by calling back. Also, when you're being text by friends or
family to meet them somewhere, be sure to call back to confirm that the message came from them. If you don't reach them, be very careful about going places to meet 'family and friends' who text you.

good point by the original poster. the only thing that would be of minor concern is that they might get your home address. but in a way i'd want them to have my home address so that if they ever come by i can beat them up for taking my garmin.

Anything with sensitive information should be password protected. You can steal my cellphone, but you won't get past the screen where it asks for the PIN to unlock it. Same thing with my laptop-you can turn power on, but that's as far as you'll get. The only way to be safe is to secure your stuff. And pick a high number-if you use 0000,it only takes one try to unlock.

One my friends txted a second friend "Did she like the ring?". Yes, he was planning on proposing after dinner. She was playing a game on his phone and saw the txt pop up. Ruined his surprise. TXT and Email are secure only if the receiving device is in the hands of it's owner.

She accepted, so at least it turned out all right. Or not, depending on your perspective.

-Wow-

common sense dictate the following:

1. always take your GPS with you (not always possible when you've got kids with you, pda / keys / cameras etc on a trip)

2. place your contact information (cellphone # and email only) on the splash screen of the GPS. If found by honest person it will be returned to you.

3. Lock the GPS with a 4 digit PIN #, which will buy you some time if the GPS is stolen, by protecting your recent locations (home, etc). Choose a safe location that is hard to guess by the thief but easy for you.

4. Don't use your home address as the GPS home address. Use a local store like McDonald's, Starbucks, etc, as your home address in the GPS.

5. Register Garmin unit with Garmin. TomTom with TomTom.com.

6. When you carry insurance / registration info in the car, take the time to scan the information to your computer, then cut out the home address information. That way if your car gets stolen the thieves do not have your home address on these documents.

7. Do not leave mail, etc in your car that has your home address.

8. If your cellphone has a lock feature, use it, so thieves can't use your cellphone to look up address info, family info, etc.

Not doing any of these things and claiming that it's not worth doing is a cop out. When you get robbed you'll wish you took the time to follow these tips.

My preference...
I always take it with me and I use the lock.

Me too-

Same here.

I use the lock, but not to prevent it from being stolen. If someone does steal it, I don't want them to be able to use it. I'd rather they get pissed and throw it in a lake! At least it will be nothing more than a paper weight to them, and they won't have gotten any satisfaction from stealing it.

There is the other slight possibility that it somehow ends up at a pawn shop or flea market, and if some other idiot buys it will contact Garmin to try to unlock it.

After reading through these posts I have changed my mind and will lock my Garmin. The personal information in the wrong hands would just add to the physical loss.

While sitting in my local WalMart parking lot finishing a phone call, a woman pulled in front of me. She got out of her car with GPS in hand. She placed the GPS on the roof of her car reached back in for a bag, closed the door and proceeded to walk away.
I got out of my car, grab her GPS and followed her into the store. I asked her if she remembered where she parked her car. She looked at me real funny, (I guess I would have done the same.) she then turned and started to walk away with out answering me, when I said how about your GPS, as I reached out to give it to her. Wish I could tell you about the great evening we had together, but she embarrassingly smiled, said thank you several times and walked away.

I'll leave my GPS in the car . . . . locked.

Once you start locking your GPS is just becomes habit. I feel like my data is safer and it is useless to someone if I lose it for some reason.

I turned on my Nuvi and of course the pin number screen came up. I accidently entered the wrong pin and the Nuvi locked a\up and gave me the screen about going to my secure location to unlock. Since I was about 20 miles away and having to go in the opposite direction, this was not possible. I switched it off and went on to my destination. About 30 minutes after I was finished with the delivery, I switched it back on and to my surprise, the pin screen popped up. I entered my pin and the Garmin came to life. I was about 50 miles from my security place then.

I was just curious if this has happened to anybody else?

That's what it's supposed to do. If you enter an incorrect PIN, it tells you about the secure location option and then sleeps for a minute or two, then prompts you again for the PIN. If you had just waited for a minute or two, it would have gone back to the "enter PIN" screen.

Or you can just quickly switch it off, then rightaway turn it back on, and it will give you another try at your pin-#.

My 760 doesn't do that. I've still got to wait, after turning it off.

I agree with the idea of having a wait time between password tries.

make it 5 digits, 3 strikes system, 15 minute wait after that. same way most forum software works.

You mean you don't leave your vehicle registration in your car, explain that if you get stopped or are in a accident

A lot of states are putting the registration on the windshield next to the safety inspection instead of having a paper copy in your glove box and an sticker on your plate. Makes it easier for the police to check for out-of-date registration and inspection. Also maybe a safety thing for police - not allowing people to reach into glove box to come out with something other than registration.

In CA the registration used to be attached to the windshield-- easy if you wanted an address to steal or stalk women--or other! The law was changed many years ago and now the papers can be in the glovebox.

Not needed in Illinois. All the police ask for is Drivers licience and Insurance card.

I quickly read through what everyone has posted and didn't see anyone else mention anything about the possibility of tracking down whoever stole the GPS by using it against them. As long as you didn't lock it, the thief may start using it and could quite possibly be tracked.

To be honest, I really don't know the feasibility of this since I think that using a GPS is more or less completely anonymous (although I have noticed that my Garmin has a unit ID in addition to the part and serial numbers), but it's just a thought. It would be similar to the way GM uses OnStar, Mercedes uses TeleAid, etc., except I believe that they also use cellular telephone towers in addition to GPS (at least I know Mercedes does), but that may just be for the voice/audio part of the system rather than locating through triangulation/trilateration.

Who knows, maybe it really isn't possible or would be far too complicated (or expensive) to track down what is really a relatively inexpensive and unimportant device. It's not quite the same as getting your car stolen.

Edit: I read though my post and realized that people may be confused as to how you could track down your GPS. Obviously, you would have to get in contact with someone who has access to the data transmitted back and forth within the Global Positioning System. I would think the manufacturer of your device would be a good place to start. From there they may refer you to another agency that could be of more help, but who really knows. Like I said, all of this might be more trouble and/or expense than it's really worth.

IT might be. I lock mine all the time just to be somewhat on the safe side. It keeps most people honest, it's not perfect but it works.

After doing a quick Google search, It seems that the key to tracking GPSr equipped vehicles/devices is actually the cellular signal. In the examples I gave above, the cellular part of the system would be used to transmit the location data while the GPSr would simply do its job of locating its position (not transmitting that data to somewhere else).

Since probably 100% of GPS equipped navigation devices do not have any kind of capability to communicate via cellular signals (not Bluetooth), it seems that it would actually be impossible to track down any device that only has GPSr capabilities. However, I could be wrong. I really don't know.

These things are pretty cheap that as long as I have a backup of my info; I can put it on another unit if I need to.

The GPS you use in your car/boat/motorcycle does not have the ability to transmit data. So there is no way to track the device. Now on a cell phone it would be a different matter. Since the cell phone does transmit data out through the cell towers, and the built in GPS will hone it in within a few feet. So it is possible to find the missing phone by GPS signals, but not a GPS itself. For all those who can use this, there is a program called Roblock and if someone steals your PDA phone, you can text the phone a simple message and it not only lock your phone, but set off a siren on it. And for those with Simms cards, if the thief installs a new Sims card in it, Roblock will text you a message and you can lock the phone from wherever you are.

I think instead of the lock, they should install some sort of lojack like tracker. They could actually program it to ping off of cell towers for no other reason then to allow for tracking. This could be useful for as a subscription service to parents as well. You could pay a certain fee then access the tracker on a web site and track the kiddies.