General Motors’ OnStar service has been offering stolen vehicle location since 1996, but on Thursday OnStar launched a whole new system to keep your vehicle even safer. Dubbed Stolen Vehicle Slowdown, the new system is able slow down OnStar-equipped vehicle stolen in the United States and Canada.
The new technology will be offered on over 1 million 2009 model year GM vehicles, with already 20,000 such equipped vehicles on the road.
The system works by first locating the stolen vehicle through GPS after it has been reported stolen. OnStar then contacts the local authorities and alerts them to the vehicle’s location. Once police are in place, the police place a call to the OnSatr communication center, requesting a vehicle shut down. An OnStar representative then activates Stolen Vehicle Slowdown, which turns on the vehicle’s hazard lights and slowly cuts power. Although the throttle pedal will be useless to the car thief, power-steering and braking functions will remain intact as to not cause an accident.
For those wary about handing over such controls to Big Brother, customers can chose to have the Stolen Vehicle Slowdown disabled at any time with a simple phone call – no need to make a trip to a GM dealer. Stolen Vehicle Slowdown comes bundled with OnStar’s one free year of service, but then requires a monthly service fee after that.
