Answer: I can shut those off

Oh no , see, that won't work , you are so special that in the exabytes of data being acquired there is a committee of at least 20 people in China analyzing how much yogurt you eat.

Read this and burn you computer, sleep under a Faraday cage.

You dont think electric door locks can be locked remotely ?

Go back and read the bit I DID quote and compare it to the bits I did NOT quote and maybe you will have a fucking clue.

Jesus christ.

So you dont think cars made today (or from about 2016 ish to now) dont watch your every move

Please feel free to show me where I said that, because if anyone would fucking read what I actually quoted and responded to, they wouldn't look fucking stupid.

If the accessory belt fails to spin your power steering pump, it isn't going to pump. Be it a failed belt (which will also impact the alternator and AC compressor) or a seized bearing or whatever else. No pumping, no pressure. No pressure, no power steering. And a sufficient leak, without regular topping up, will eventually allow air into the system. Which, again, means no pressure and no power steering.

How easily (and costly) it's repaired depends entirely on the nature of the failure. A belt might only set you back $15 to $25 USD and be doable with a cheap socket set and a breaker bar that reaches the tensioner (if you've got an automatic tensioner). A bearing might only be $7 but how many people already have the puller and press? Removing and replacing a failed pump? For my old truck the OEM part is discontinued. We're starting at $80 (remanufactured) going up to around $200 new aftermarket with a reservoir and pulley. And I've the luxury of a spacious engine bay and longitudinally mounted engine. Good luck to anyone with a small car and transverse mounted engine; taking off a wheel, popping clips, removing skirting and wheel well plastics... "Easy" becomes relative mighty quick.

I haven't worked a day in my life as a mechanic (not even small engine) that wasn't for myself or friends and family, and I still know enough to say you're either wrong or incomplete in your claims.

Throttle cables on 50 year old vehicles work just fine.

No, they don't. They require regular maintenance, like very other mechanical part on your car. My 1980 Mercedes and equally old Honda motorcycle are both cable-controlled. The linkage in the Mercedes is all sorts of worn out, to the point I can't accelerate at full throttle anymore. And guess what? Mercedes doesn't make those parts anymore.

Several have had tps issues.

A Throttle Position Sensor, as you understand it, is not used on electronic throttle bodies. At all. Inside the throttle body, the stepper motor itself (which is not a potentiometer) feeds the position back to the ECU.

And good luck buying one when they stop making the exact model for your specific vehicle when the factory in China quits making them.

TPS sensors were often shared among several models in a lineup, sometimes carried to newer models, and even over different manufacturers at times. They're stupid simple to make and fix.

So, here's the deal. The cars you see as "simple EFI", like 90s/00s cars, are still highly computerized. My 2008 Sienna has at least 10 different computers, yet has none of the "smart" stuff and no serial/VIN pairing... Well, except maybe like the security module, but nobody gives a shit about that and it can be tuned out anyway.

This era of vehicle is my favorite to tinker with, because in my own career I specialize in low voltage electronic systems, automation, mechanical systems, and making it all play nice together from a computer.

(Proofreading Lka1988 here - long tangent warning)

Well it turns out that vehicles made from the mid-2000s through the mid-to-late 2010s is perfect for someone like me. I have two Toyotas: the aforementioned Sienna, and a 2015 Highlander. Both have the same engine, the legendary 2GR-FE V6, based in the same platform (Camry), yet drive completely differently in terms of engine control and the precision of it.

• The Highlander has a beautiful, smooth as silk U660F 6-speed and glides through the gears up to speed.

• Meanwhile, the Sienna just absolutely fucking freight-trains itself to speed through the ever-clunky U151E 5-speed with 277k original miles and a sporadic ATF/filter change thrown in for good measure.

I've added a bunch of factory upgrade shit to the Sienna for dirt cheap thanks to junkyards. Adding fog lights just needed the lights themselves, the appropriate headlight stalk, and hey, might as well grab the light sensor from this XLE over here and it's headlight stalk....aaaand now I have fully automatic headlights and fog lights for $40. The harness was already provisioned for it. All the computers needed was to see the components. Worked the first time, 100% factory. I did this with the optional power inverter, auto dimming rear view mirror, all of the optional steering wheel buttons, hood latch sensor, and a bunch more factory shit that I forgot about because I did it so soon.

Anyway, this isn't the first vehicle I've done this to. I added additional factory steering wheel buttons to my former 2013 Caravan, so its aftermarket Pioneer headunit and the iDatalink module had more input controls to program. Which I did.

Point is, all of these cars never had a single problem with their electronic throttles, or any part of the computer systems that wasn't blatantly user error. In fact, the only kind of problem I've ever had with any of that kind of vehicle was a mechanical problem. The Caravan's transmission shit itself around 100k or so. The Sienna's power door cable snapped around 250k. I fixed it with improved parts from eBay for $30. The Highlander.... Ehhhh... it's only got 127k and hasn't given us a single issue in our many years of ownership. I get why people tend to keep them the longest...

Although, I think I got you beat. My 1980 Mercedes 240D has 483k miles, and change. It just shat a valve guide. Still ran though. And I get why people love these things, they are stupid simple to work on. I had the freakishly-heavy cylinder head off in 3 hours. From "hood closed" to "head on my workbench". I took my time, too. This is a SOHC diesel, mind you, so there's also timing chain I had to worry about.