These days there's an app for almost everything, and now there's an app for almost every new car. So-called "remote apps" allow car owners to control features such as door locking and unlocking or check on a vehicle's whereabouts from almost any location with just a touch of a smartphone screen, as long as they have a connection to the cloud. While these apps are typically free, a subscription to a telematics system like GM's OnStar service is usually required to connect to the car via an embedded cellular modem.
Because remote apps are typically tied to telematics systems, they provide similar features, such as calling for roadside assistance, checking on vehicle maintenance and scheduling dealer service. Remote apps are also providing more conveniences to car owners and are starting to integrate with "wearable" technology. But they're also raising concerns about making cars vulnerable to hackers.
Remote App Standard Features
While automakers offer different remote app functions, almost all include standard features such as the ability to remotely lock and unlock a car's doors, summon roadside assistance and flash the parking lights and sound the horn to find a vehicle in a parking lot. Other customary remote app features include remote engine starting and displaying the location of a car on a digital map.
An example of a variation on this common theme is GM's approach to remote apps. In addition to an OnStar RemoteLink app that includes the most commonplace features, GM also has separate but similar apps for each of its brands: MyBuick, MyCadillac, MyChevrolet and MyGMC. While they all include a tab that links to the OnStar RemoteLink app, the individual GM brand apps add a built-in (but abbreviated) owner's manual, a guide to instrument-panel indicators and a Parking Reminder feature that not only shows the location of the car on a map and has a parking meter timer, but also allows you to take a photo of the parking spot with a smartphone's camera.
Many of GM's remote app features require a current OnStar subscription. But starting with 2014 OnStar-equipped vehicles, GM made unlocking doors, activating the horn and lights and remotely starting the engine using the OnStar RemoteLink app free for the first five years the vehicle is owned. That's the case even if the owner chooses not to subscribe to OnStar's paid telematics services.
Luxury Vehicle Apps
Luxury automakers often provide extra remote app features, including ones that let owners keep closer tabs on their car. The app for Mercedes-Benz's mbrace telematics system has a Curfew Minder that will send an alert if the vehicle is started during preset periods. The Lexus Enform remote app's Guest Driver Monitor pings the owner if the vehicle is started or exceeds preset speed limits and times, a preset number of miles driven or a specified distance from a set location.
Remote apps from luxury brands also typically add more convenience features. The mbrace app's Send2Benz feature can transmit an address found online or from a contact on a phone to the car's navigation system. The My BMW remote app has a similar feature, which lets the owner send an address found using Google to the vehicle's nav system. The MyLincoln Mobile app works with the Google Now app on Android phones to suggest times to remotely start a vehicle, based on the owner's calendar. For example, if the owner has an appointment at 9 a.m. and it takes 30 minutes to get there, the app could display a notification (known as a Now card) at, say, 8:25 as a reminder to initiate a remote start so the vehicle is heated or cooled by the climate control system before the person leaves for their appointment.
The Audi MMI connect app has a feature called Picture Destinations, which culls the address from any geo-coded digital picture so the car owner doesn't have to manually enter it. Say someone asks you to meet for coffee. Instead of sending the address, your contact can text a picture of that just-ordered latte. The Audi MMI connect app will use the photo's geo-coded information to decipher the location and enter it into your car's navigation system.
Keeping Apps From Getting Hacked
If that last feature has you thinking that there might be a bit too much info sharing going on, you're not alone. The connectivity between portable devices and cars raises the inevitable question of whether remote vehicle apps are secure. Thilo Koslowski, who covers auto technology at the consulting firm Gartner, says that while the risk of car hacks is low, "It's becoming a really big concern.
"I do expect that some companies may take this too lightly," he adds, "and this could lead to some very bad news for the auto companies and consumers."
Michael Deitz, Hyundai's senior group manager for connected cars, says that Hyundai "manages the interaction between the server and the vehicle, and that goes through a number of validation steps.
"We also have implemented a [security] spec that our R&D and our own internal Hyundai-affiliated company developed, and that's something that's not published," he says. "In addition, wireless carriers provide their own level of security on top of that."
Most remote apps incorporate some type of layered encryption, says John Ellis, managing director of the consulting firm Ellis & Associates. Ellis formerly worked at Ford, where he held the title of global technologist in the carmaker's Connected Services business.
"All system architectures I'm aware of don't talk to the car directly," he adds. "There's always a middle point, which is the connection to the cloud. There's no direct communication between the app and the car with these types of applications, at least not today."
While Ellis concedes that almost any secure system can be hacked, he adds that there's no real incentive for hackers to attack connected cars until there's some sort of "repeatable profit" motive.
"Right now it's really, really hard because of all the layers of the security," he says. "It's not an easy task, but it's not an impossible task — and it's not this apocalypse that you hear about. But the automakers still have to be cautious and continue to work on security."
Exceptions and EV Apps
While more automakers now offer remote smartphone apps, there are still some that don't, including Acura, Fiat, Honda, Jaguar/Land Rover, Mazda and Mitsubishi. Some automakers only offer smartphone apps for their plug-in electric and plug-in electric hybrid vehicles. Apps for the Nissan Leaf, Kia Soul Electric and Ford Focus Electric as well as the C-Max Energi and Fusion Energi plug-in hybrids allow owners to search for charging stations and keep tabs on charge status. The apps also let owners schedule when the vehicle begins charging and turn on the climate control to heat or cool the interior while the car is plugged in. That's a common way to save battery power.
The BMW i Remote app for the i3 electric car even has a "multimodal transportation" feature that monitors real-time traffic and alerts the driver when other nearby forms of transportation, such as trains and buses, may be faster ways to reach a destination rather than driving would be.
The app routes the driver to the nearest public transit station and even includes departure schedules in 17 countries — but not the U.S. Similarly, if a driver prefers to pedal for part of the journey, a "Call a Bike" point of interest feature can find bikes available for renting or sharing near a destination or transit point. That feature is only available in Germany, however.
Watch for What's Next
While U.S. drivers may not be prepared to give up the comfort of their cars for a train or a bike, several automakers are betting they'll be ready to embrace the use of remote apps through wearables, such as smartwatches. At this year's Consumer Electronics Show (CES), BMW announced integration of its i Remote App with the Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch. That means i3 owners can check the EV's battery range and send navigation directions to the car. Hyundai also showed a smartwatch concept that can access features of the company's Blue Link smartphone app.
The benefit of using a smartwatch is that drivers would be able to control aspects of the vehicle and check vital functions without taking out a phone or even opening an app. The BMW owner can check if the i3's doors are locked simply by tapping on the Galaxy Gear's touch display, while the Hyundai smartwatch app works via voice activation.
Hyundai's goal is to have an Android smartphone watch app out in the first quarter, says Deitz. The existing Hyundai Blue Link app will work with the Android Wear app to communicate with compatible smartwatches, and Hyundai is working on having similar functionality ready when the Apple Watch is available later this year, Deitz adds.
There Will Be an App for That Car
Whether we're wearing our apps or carrying them in our phones in the good old-fashioned way, concerns about their security haven't stopped people from using them (and sharing personal information via social media). Fears of hacking probably won't prevent remote apps for cars from proliferating.
"I expect virtually all automakers to offer this type of functionality, since consumers will expect it," Koslowski says. That's especially true once car owners discover the conveniences that remote apps offer, just as with all the other apps on their phones.
Deitz notes that more than 80 percent of recent Hyundai buyers who use the automaker's Blue Link system have also signed up to use the remote app.
"When we look at things like remote start, the mobile app is clearly the way people like to use that feature," he says. "In 2014, we performed over 5.3 million of those."
