Galesburg Police yesterday responded to Sumner Street for a report of vehicle theft. Police met with a 61-year-old woman who said sometime overnight her vehicle was stolen from her driveway. The woman admitted that she sometimes forgets to lock her car, but was in possession of both sets of keys. Police observed no broken glass in the driveway. All that was left behind was the woman’s face masks and hair ties that were tossed from the car. The vehicle is a 2017 light green Kia Soul with a dent in the driver’s side front quarter panel. The vehicle was listed as stolen and the investigation is ongoing.
Hyundai and Kia unveiled software that was designed to thwart an epidemic of thefts of their vehicles, caused by a security flaw that was exposed on TikTok and other social media sites. So far, it hasn’t solved the problem. Across the country, thieves are still driving off with the vehicles at an alarming rate. Data from seven U.S. cities gathered by The Associated Press shows that the number of Hyundai and Kia thefts is still growing despite the companies’ efforts to fix the glitch, which makes 8.3 million vehicles relatively easy targets for thieves.