

Here we are talking about things not completely paid off. If you use a loan to buy something (a car, a phone, a house, whatever) until you paid off all the loan the thing is not yours.
If you don’t pay your car loan, they can reposses it, if you don’t pay your phone loan they block it, if you don’t pay your data plan they close it. I don’t see anything strange here.
I think to remember to have read something about the possibility for a car manufacturer to remotely disable the car if requested or defaulted, something like once you park the car and turn off the engine it will not start again so no security problem, but I cannot pinpoing when/where i read it or if it ever went beyond the stage of an idea.