Originally Posted by
prathmann
They've been commercially available for quite some time:
Robot Check
Not very secure if someone actually takes a hacksaw or even a Swiss Army Knife to it, but I presume the idea is that most thieves will avoid bikes with U-locks and instead go for the ones secured with cables. Don't know how many bike thieves take the time to check the make and material in each U-lock.
Thanks for the link. Once had a bike with steel U-lock I had to remove w/circular saw--made some noise but surprisingly easy, ~1 minute to cut. Pro thieves probably only deterred by ultra-heavy chains; probably the best we can usually do is to frustrate casual opportunistic theives.