Illinois attorney general urges Kia, Hyundai to take ‘comprehensive action’ over Chicago area car thefts

A coalition of attorneys common — together with Illinois Atty. Gen. Kwame Raoul — urged Kia and Hyundai to take “complete motion” over Chicago-area automobile thefts.

Kia and Hyundai lately introduced a customer support marketing campaign to improve the software program of affected automobiles.

Kia says it has instantly contacted greater than 1.1 million homeowners and lessees of impacted Kia automobiles to “allow them to know of the provision of the software program improve and to advise them to schedule a free set up at any Kia vendor,” based on an announcement launched by the automaker. Kia was anticipated to contact greater than 2 million homeowners and lessees by the top of March.

Hyundai has reached out to greater than 1 million homeowners and lessees about its personal free software program replace, based on an announcement from the corporate.

However Raoul and the coalition mentioned in a letter that the plan was “inadequate, incomplete and lengthy overdue.”

“I urge Kia and Hyundai to speed up a software program improve to make sure shoppers’ automobiles are correctly geared up to protect towards theft,” Raoul mentioned in an announcement. “I stand dedicated to defending shoppers and our communities, and I urge these automobile firms to do their half to stop these thefts.”

Raoul and the coalition of attorneys common mentioned that Kia and Hyundai “selected to not embody anti-theft immobilizers as commonplace gear on a number of automobile fashions bought in the USA, regardless of together with the immobilizers on the identical affected fashions bought in different international locations.”

“Because of this, the variety of thefts and using stolen automobiles to commit different thefts within the U.S. considerably elevated,” based on a press launch from the legal professional common’s workplace.

A TikTok social media problem put a highlight on the automobiles’ lack of an immobilizer and resulted in at the very least 14 reported crashes and eight fatalities, based on the Nationwide Freeway Site visitors Security Administration. The problem reveals TikTok viewers how one can hot-wire Kia and Hyundai automobiles with a USB wire and a screwdriver.

Final yr, there have been greater than 7,000 Hyundai and Kia thefts in Chicago, which account for 10% of all registered Kia automobiles and seven% of all registered Hyundai automobiles within the metropolis, based on the legal professional common’s workplace.

In response to the feedback made by the coalition, Kia mentioned it was “dedicated to working with officers and with regulation enforcement businesses on the state and native degree to make sure automobile safety.”

“Along with this [software] improve, we now have already supplied greater than 23,000 steering wheel locks to over 120 regulation enforcement businesses throughout the nation for them to distribute — for gratis — to impacted homeowners,” the assertion mentioned. “We are going to proceed to make these locks accessible as they’re wanted.”

Hyundai additionally initiated a program to start reimbursement to eligible clients for his or her buy of steering wheel locks.

The corporate has shipped greater than 40,000 steering wheel locks to greater than 370 regulation enforcement businesses and can “proceed to supply free steering wheel locks to them for distribution to residents who personal or lease affected fashions.”

In September the Freeway Loss Knowledge Institute, a unit of the Insurance coverage Institute for Freeway Security, discovered that Hyundais and Kias with out immobilizers had a automobile theft declare price of two.18 per 1,000 insured automobile years. The remainder of the trade mixed had a price of 1.21. An insured automobile yr is the same as one automobile insured for one yr.

The institute in contrast automobiles from the 2015 by means of 2019 mannequin years. It studied automobile theft claims from 2021. Hyundai says all fashions produced after Nov. 1, 2021, have immobilizers as commonplace gear.

Insurance coverage giants State Farm and Progressive briefly stopped accepting new buyer purposes in some states for sure fashions made by each manufacturers due to the thefts.

Contributing: Related Press