Volvo to replace car keys with an app

Image 1 of 3

Volvo is to trial a smartphone app they claim could replace conventional car keys in the near future.

New customers will be given the choice of using their mobile phones as a digital key, linked to a Bluetooth installation inside the car. The company hopes to have the technology available in vehicles on sale next year.

Using the app, drivers will be able to lock and unlock their vehicles as well as start and stop the car as normal, say Volvo.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

However, the firm is keen to highlight different areas it says could potentially be beneficial.

For example, drivers could use their phone to access more than one vehicle, rather than having to carry around different sets of keys. This could prove important if the company introduces some form of subscription-based "mobility" service, as drivers could have the keys to any Volvo in any location beamed straight to them. The same principle would apply to rental cars.

A digital key could also be sent to the mobile phones of family, friends and co-workers, making it slightly easier to share a car.

Replacing the trusty car key with an app may seem highly unnecessary to some, but Volvo says it's not "interested in technology for the sake of technology". A trial period on a fleet of cars at Gothenburg airport will be followed by the introduction of the technology on a few cars in the Volvo range next year.

Potential problems such as the phone running out of battery are "already a factor of modern life", Volvo told the BBC, saying that similar tasks have already been delegated to phones, such as digital boarding passes at airports.

"Additional security measures" would be used in vehicles equipped with the technology, added the company.

"We will not bring anything to the market unless we feel it is totally safe and secure," Volvo told the IB Times. The company also argued that a phone, which features measures such as passcodes or fingerprint scanners, would be more secure than traditional keys.

This is not the first time Volvo has looked to embrace mobile technology. The firm used the same idea over the festive season to offer an in-car delivery service for Christmas shopping.