Car theft protection and tracking

An alert while the car is still moving

Set a geofence around home, the office or the forecourt, and the tracker tells you the moment the car leaves it. Movement with the ignition off is also an alert, which catches a car being winched onto a flatbed, the method used for most keyless thefts that go wrong for the thief.

Hidden, and it says when it is interfered with

A wired tracker hidden behind the dashboard is far harder to find than anything plugged into the OBD port, which is the first place a thief looks. If power is cut, the internal battery sends an unplug alert; if the mobile signal is blocked, jamming detection flags that too.

• Fit it out of sight, and away from the OBD socket.
• Treat an unplug or jamming alert as a theft in progress.
• Keep the keys in a signal-blocking pouch: the tracker is the backstop, not the lock.

What to do if it is taken

Report the theft, give the police the live location from your phone and keep the map open so you can tell them where it stops. Do not go after the car yourself. Recovery rates are far better when police get a current position rather than a last-seen address.