Roughly two years after Hyundai and Kia rolled out a free anti-theft software update for millions of vehicles left vulnerable to a viral hot-wiring method, the two automakers still have not published a national completion rate, and the compensation fund tied to the defect remains frozen by an ongoing appeal. About 3.8 million Hyundai vehicles and 4.5 million Kia vehicles, roughly 8 million cars combined, were made eligible for the update starting February 14, 2023, but the only completion figure either brand has ever confirmed publicly is a fraction of that total.

The One Number Kia Ever Released

In the weeks after the software campaign launched, Kia told reporters that more than 165,000 customers had received the software installation out of roughly 2 million vehicles it had made the update available for at that point, while it had contacted over 2 million owners in total. Hyundai, covering an even larger pool of nearly 4 million vehicles, according to its own owner resource page for the “Anti-Theft Software Upgrade” campaign, would not answer how many vehicles had actually gotten the fix. Neither company has since published an updated national completion percentage, and because the fix was structured as a voluntary service campaign rather than a formal NHTSA safety recall, it falls outside the quarterly completion-rate reporting that the agency requires for standard recalls, according to the advocacy group the Center for Auto Safety, which told CBS News that regulators and the public “won’t know how many are on the road with the problem.”

Key Points

• Roughly 8 million Hyundai and Kia vehicles nationwide were made eligible for the free anti-theft software starting in February 2023.
• The only completion number ever disclosed publicly was Kia’s count of 165,000 vehicles updated, reported in the campaign’s opening weeks.
• Hyundai has never disclosed a completion figure, and because the fix is a voluntary “service campaign,” it is not subject to NHTSA’s mandatory recall completion reporting.
• A California multistate letter found that roughly one-quarter of the affected fleet cannot receive the software fix at all due to older hardware and instead requires steering wheel locks or other physical devices.
• The related $145 million class-action settlement fund is still frozen: the Ninth Circuit ruled on January 8, 2026, but an objector’s Supreme Court petition filed May 26, 2026 has paused payments, with a decision not expected until around October 2026.

What’s Affected

The campaign covers turn-key ignition Hyundai and Kia models built roughly between 2011 and 2022 that shipped without an engine immobilizer, the standard electronic chip that stops a car from starting without its matching key. A letter California’s Attorney General sent alongside a multistate coalition explained that roughly one-quarter of the roughly 8 million affected vehicles cannot receive the software update at all because their older starting systems are not compatible with it, meaning full software coverage of the fleet was never mathematically possible; those owners were instead supposed to receive steering wheel locks, wheel locks, or other physical anti-theft hardware. The lack of a public completion tracker means an owner has no easy way to check whether their own car, or a used car they are shopping for, is one of the ones still running the original, unpatched software.

What Owners Should Do

Owners of eligible 2011 to 2022 Hyundai and Kia models with a traditional key-and-cylinder ignition, rather than push-button start, should check their vehicle identification number directly through the manufacturer’s own campaign lookup tool rather than assume the update was already applied at a past dealer visit, since plaintiffs’ counsel in the federal class-action case continues to advise owners of eligible vehicles to get the free software update “as soon as possible” even years after the initial rollout. Owners who already filed a settlement claim should also know that no settlement checks are currently being distributed while the Supreme Court petition is pending, and that the broader multistate claims window for cash reimbursement runs through March 31, 2027. Anyone whose vehicle cannot take the software update at all should ask their dealer about the physical steering-wheel lock or ignition-cylinder remedy the settlement is supposed to provide instead.

What is notable two and a half years on is not that the fix failed, but that nobody outside the automakers can verify how far it actually spread. A recall triggers a public paper trail with NHTSA; a voluntary campaign covering 8 million vehicles apparently does not, which leaves owners, insurers, and police departments guessing at exactly how many of these cars are still driving around with the same vulnerability that made them a target in the first place.