Police and car insurers say thieves are using laptop computers to hack into late-model cars’ electronic ignitions to steal the vehicles, raising alarms about the auto industry’s greater use of computer controls, in a report to the Wall Street Journal.

This follows several incidents worldwide, where thieves have used wireless access to jump start cars – eliminating any need for brute force.

“Fiat Chrysler, General Motors Co. and Tesla Motors Inc. have had to alter their car electronics over the last two years after learning their vehicles could be hacked.”

“In an era where we call our cars computers on wheels, it becomes more and more difficult to stop hacking” said Yoni Heilbronn, vice president of marketing for Israel-based Argus Cyber Security Ltd., a company developing technologies to stop or detect hackers. “What we now need is multiple layers of protection to make the efforts of carrying out a cyberattack very costly and deter hackers from spending the time and effort.”

You can check out one such incident below, where a thief was caught on camera stealing a 2010 Jeep Wrangler in Houston, Texas:

Is you car “hackable”? Let us know in the comments below and in our forums.

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