Ford May Repossess Your Car Remotely with ‘Innovative’ New System

One of America’s Big Three car manufacturers, Ford Motor Company, may soon be able to “repossess” your car “remotely.” It is applying to patent a system through which cars would “drive themselves” to repossession lots.

Now They Get to Rob You of Your Car

Ford’s Orwellian invention to get people to clear up delayed car payments has been revealed by a patent application that Ford Global Technologies filed on August 20, 2021 with the US Trademark and Patent Office.

The patent application in question was published officially for public review on February 23 under the official procedure, The Detroit Free Press reported.

It quoted Ford Company spokesman Wes Sherwood as saying the scary-sounding patent remained pending and had not been granted yet.

To make the whole development seem even more absurd, yet even more real, Ford’s patent application makes it clear it is about new “systems and methods” developed in order “to repossess a vehicle.”

The remote vehicle repossession options that inspired minds describe in the patent application include having the car drive itself from the poor owner’s private property so a tow truck could pick it up.

Alternatively, it could drive itself to a junkyard if a number of factors such as mileage indicate it is of very low value. Remarkably, remote car repossession is only a last resort option for the system that Ford is seeking to patent.

Those Are Some Considerate Engineers Ford Has

Thus, the application mentions a number of “non-confrontation” strategies to resolve nonpayment problems – such as reminder messages and bank warnings popping up on a vehicle display screen, as well as on the owner’s smartphone.

If those fail to lead to the clearing of delayed installments, the remote car repossession process would escalate to sending or turning on audio with an “unpleasant” sound in a seeming bid to terrorize the wretched owner.

If that doesn’t work, then Ford’s ingenious engineers have found more terror weapons for causing discomfort, such as disabling windows, seat controls, radio dials, GPS, and other car features.

The intriguing, but clearly highly considerate solutions, put forth by the Ford Motor Company reflect its care for the installments coming from delinquent owners. These include remotely locking the vehicle on weekends, thus still allowing the owner to use the car to go to work during weekdays.

A commentary by TheDrive.com pointed out if a person’s vehicle had an internet connection in any way, Ford’s proposed Orwellian system would “theoretically work on it.”

It also pointed out the remote repossession system – up to the point of the car betraying you and driving itself off to be repossessed – could work without the need to perform any “physical modifications,” that is, without the addition of any extra hardware.

Ford’s inventor engineers also describe in their patent application a “repossession computer,” which could happily get installed into future vehicles.

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