Hello, this is my first time to use this site and I am sort of a newbie for using forums in general but I will get to the point.
I have a 2016 Nissan Sentra SL. I have owned it for approximately 4 months and up till now it has been fine except for one issue a couple of months ago when we tried to get a locksmith to program a key fob we had purchased on Ebay , which turned out to be a nightmare, because it put the car into theft mode and he couldn't get it to work with the new key fob and the original key fob became unprogrammed somehow. It was a very long day, and we wound up needing a ride home. The next day he finally had his son program it with a totally new key fob and it worked. I have been driving it a couple of months now with no problem. Long story short, I have things going on in my life that give me reasons to think my car could have been hacked just recently. Friday August 3rd I drove my car to my x husbands home and left it parked there while my daughter drove me to visit my son, who lives 1 1/2 hours away. We were gone about 10 hours. The car was locked. When we got back it started and I drove it home, which is about 17 miles, I parked it and didn't drive it again until the 9th when I was at an appointment and it was parked outside the office building with the doors locked. All of a sudden the horn started blowing like someone was just laying on the horn. It wouldn't stop. It wasn't like a car alarm. It was a constant blowing horn! I unlocked it and tried to start it and it gave me that key fob warning on the dash. It is a push button start. I kept trying to start it and nothing would happen it kept blowing and not starting. So I pulled the latch under the dash to pop the hood and that was when the horn stopped blowing. Then I disconnected the negative battery cable and reconnected it twice with no luck starting. Finally I had to have it towed to Nissan where it took them 5 days and they have just finally figured out that the IPDM module has to be replaced and it is going to cost just under 800.00 dollars! Why would a 2016 with 54k miles have this happen? I have been reading and watching YouTube about car hacking. Can this be a result of car hacking? Can anyone help?

I doubt your car was hacked.

Did you or Nissan change the battery in the FOB?

Lol, that Sentra isn't techy enough to be hacked. Direct hardwire access only.

Yeah... most likely not hacked, just poor body modules from Nissan.

I also think it's just bad luck. If you or someone you know is handy and willing, you can replace the IPDM yourselves.
To the layman it's just a fancy fuse box, which doesn't need any special programming upon replacement.

Looking through the Sentra forum, I didn't get many hits when I searched for "IPDM" so I am inclined to assume your odds with a used unit from eBay wouldn't be too bad,

They told me it wasn't the key fob when they first checked it. I finally got it back today and I am $776.12 poorer as a result of a fuse box that went bad for no reason. They said there was no sign of corrosion or anything that would explain why it malfunctioned. I can't believe i am having this kind of trouble with a car with such low miles and is only 2 years old.

Yeah I would think that would be covered under warranty, but who knows.

PapaSmurf2k3 wrote: ↑

Sun Aug 19, 2018 11:28 am

Yeah I would think that would be covered under warranty, but who knows.

It would be, but she has 54k miles, so out of warranty.