https://melmagazine.com/inside-the-lawless-new-world-of-electric-scooter-hacking-5d887e155b25

If major corporations and voting infrastructure can be hacked, then it stands to reason that one could also, and much more easily, hack a $400 electric scooter. And in their rush to make dockless, app-enabled two-wheelers a way of life across every urban neighborhood worldwide — while throttling the competition — startups Bird, Lime, Scoot, Skip and Spin have caused localized backlashes while putting their tech at risk of both clever and stupid exploits.

What’s funny is that the companies tend to dismiss these vulnerabilities as insignificant. Lime’s director of government relations and strategic development, Sam Sadle, told the Dallas Observer this summer that theft and vandalism of scooters is rare because they’re so often in use. Reacting to complaints that hacking has become common, he added: “It hasn’t in any way limited our ability to operate in the markets in which we do operate.”