- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
Toyota, Progressive Insurance, and a data analytics firm are now being accused of collecting detailed personal driving information without proper consent
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Another reminder why I chose to own a bicycle.
Not an option for many of us. Even in the city, where I’ve gotten around on bicycle for years and years with no car before, it was a hostile environment, and motorists hate bicyclists with a passion. I didn’t ride in the street either like in the lane holding up traffic either. But many would go out of their way to hit you, including police. I was too quick for them though.
I rode my bike in the a smaller city for nearly a decade regularly just fine. The one time I was hit by a car, luckily barely, I was on foot.
To me, here at least, when I left the small city,that’s where it gets wild. When the place has no pedestrians, and it’s all cars only, with really limited side walks. Those are the scary places to ride.
Time to make data sharing illegal. If it is technically needed, the industry needs to have a written contract with the user, which describes in detail which data is shared. It must be a separate contract from anything else, and one each for each industry partner.
“T&Cs update : please agree to 80 pages of impenetrable legal jargon before you can continue to use your vehicle”
Hahaha welcome to the eu
Maybe it’s time to create some rules about data brokering? It’s not really about tracking and consent, it’s about who can sell what data about whom to what parties.
It’s become an enormous business, it deals with you and I, it delights in living in the shadows, and it is almost completely unregulated. I don’t really care if Toyota records my data, I care that it’s allowed to sell it or share it.
I think a reasonable first step would be that all data about a specific person belongs to that person and nobody else. We have rules about photos, we need to expand them to data brokering, because the problem is the same: if you can be identified and placed, you are at risk.
Maybe we can just learn to disable the parts of the vehicle that spy on us. It’s actually a federal felony to alter programming on products like this that we own. But maybe a surgically placed electromagnet or cut wire could do the trick?
Because government will not be fixing anything for the better. This is the best the government will be for the forseeable future.
When approaching this proposition, remember that there will be a lot of push back that might sound sincere but remember that there are a lot of people in the data mining business and they will definitely not be arguing in good faith.
But think of the poor shareholders and their yearly revenue growth being slowed down. Don’t be selfish bro.
/s
Yeah i agree with most of what you said. I don’t have massive issues with companies tracking and recording data. By default they should only be allowed to use that data themselves (which can get a bit murky when the company in question is that of a conglomerate) and you should have to explicitly allow the sharing of data to third parties that is separate to standard TOC’s.
GDPR tried to solve this but it kind of made a lot of the options available to the user a bit of a mess and overwhelming because there’s not much regulation about what can be done with data (somewhat - there actually are limitations but it’s not very well enforced), just that the user has to say they agree. And that’s not even thinking about how the banners and pop ups are obtrusive as fuck.
I’m not smart enough to know what the actual solution should be other than I know it needs to be better than it is now.
Maybe it’s already called GDPR?
The same GDPR that allows every website or app to share your data with their 816 partners, as long as they claim they have a ‘legitimate interest’?
The Mozilla foundation did a great report on cars & privacy.
I bought a new dishwasher and that wants to be connected to the internet “to let me know when it’s finished”.
Matter over Thread is what you want. It means it can work locally with anything. You do need a Thread controller (called a “thread border router”), but most people already have one. Google Home, Alexa, or Apple things all do it.
Ikea is starting to move over to this stuff. Just be aware that they’re also trying to get rid of the old tech still.
Why though? Why does he want a networked dishwasher at all? There’s no benefit or reason for that in the first place
I really hate those guys, you know. They really are the creeps of the cosmos, buzzing around the celestial infinite with their junky little machines that never work properly or, when they do, perform functions that no sane man would require of them and,’ he added savagely, ‘go beep to tell you when they’ve done it!’
Ford Prefect
“So long & thanks for all the fish” Douglas AdamsLove Hitchhikers, but I’m not sure that replacing annoying machine beeps with annoying mobile notifications is the improvement you’re suggesting :p
Some people would like the feature where they are notified that the job is finished but don’t want to allow it to connect to the manufacturer. That would be possible if you could get one that uses Thread over Matter.
Most people either don’t care about the feature or don’t care about their privacy so it’s a real niche market.
Yeah but it seems clear from @[email protected]’s comment that they also think this is frivolity, so the unrelated niche market is a moot point in this case.
My new air purifier wants to connect to my wifi network. No thanks, I’m good.
All carmakers are doing that, not just Toyota. If someone posts a similar report about China’s BYD you are whatabouted to death, but if it is about a non-Chinese carmaker, there are no whataboutisms.
Is the data collection good or bad now? Should we have digital sovereignty in Europe and other democracies or just import ChEaP cHiNeSe CaRs?
[Edit typo.]
similar report about China’s BYD you are whatabouted to death
Nobody pretends that BYD cars don’t do that. Plenty of articles get posts here trying to create a false impression that China is uniquely bad in this regard.
You can have data sovereignty by mandating as much, Chinese cars already are built to comply with regulations of their markets.
Chinese companies must report to the Chinese party-state, and that includes sending data back to China collected also by cars. There is ample evidence for this. The Chinese government’s grip on its companies to ‘collaborate’ has even been growing stronger in recent years.
Literally any country can subpoea car manufacturers data. And the data simply would not be collected if regulations required it. This applies to every country.
What’s your deal with China? 98% of your posts seem to be any articles you can find that amount to “china bad”.
The Chinese party-state seems to be having problems telling these manufacturers to stop underselling each other right now.
Not related to the current thread but I thought it was interesting.Well, in USA private companies do that all the time too bcs of the grip of the two-party system on private companies, eg it seems authorities have seamless access to Ring cameras.
I think that sort of thing is a given and part of your regular country risk. In most big countries it’s just a question how much the gov runs companies or the other way around.
But regulation can help a lot.
Eg EU could mandate a physical switch for wireless data (ie manufacturer) in cars.… or you know, even mandatory foss or you-own-the-product-you-buy laws.
At least in the EU we should have opt in for any communication. I don’t really get it why there is no such law in place, even more so when we have GDPR and annoying cookie dialogs. 🤷♂️
Firefox extensions allow for auto clicking no on those forms. Which I do want to exists.
GDPR is getting some changes & megacorps aren’t even actually adhering to it when it’s too good for them not to (eg MS cloud).
All car makers talk to insurers?
(I know they collect personal data.)How often is it even legal for car insurance premiums (which is different from discounts) to change based on observed non-incident data (eg driving style) of an individual?
Progressive sells this as a service, you put their tracker in your car and it adjusts your rate based on driving patterns.
Oh, that’s common nowdays, as devices in olden days, now just insurers apps (depending on local laws it might only adjust your discounts, not base premium, but same diff). It predominantly lowers claims.
What isn’t common (afaik, that’s my question) is a third party doing that through general data brokering.
A bit like you driving badly on local news, the insurer sees that & ups your premium. It’s accepted with life insurance (bcs tos), but not reallynon-lifecar insurance. Idk tho, markets differ a lot.
When do companies ask for consent? Look at Google and incognito mode. Look at 23&me, I can go on. And nobody sees anything done about it. We are numbers. Not people. That’s our world
Little look at Julian Assange. Look at North Korea. Look at porn. Look at open source encryption. Look at the tor network. Look at mesh wifi. Look at private dns. Look at ungoogled chromium or librewolf. Look at webgl. Look at a little porn again. Look at the stars for a while. Look at signal. Smoke a cigarette and finally look at yourself
My new car had a whole Wikipedia worth of terms and conditions in the screen that had to accept before turning on for the first time.
There was no alternative other than “accept” or “leave the car at the dealership and pay the most expensive parking in the world forever”.
They ask for consent when they operate in the European Union
They ask for consent in the terms and conditions, you know, that long annoying text that no one really reads when signing up for stuff.
That is where they put the consent.
It’s not real consent if you’re forced to agree to use the product or if the terms allow the company to alter the terms.
And it’s so ubiquitous that the only way to avoid them altogether is to become Amish.
Good luck never agreeing to binding arbitration. And even if you do get out of it, good luck ever holding them accountable in a class action. You might be able to file a class action, but no one can join you.
The thing about 23&Me is that they’re collecting data not just on the people who signed up for the service - the ones who actually skipped and accepted the T&Cs - but their family members as well.
So are Facebook and WhatsApp. If you’ve never used either of them they definitely know who you know and have a data entry with connections ready for you to claim if you do sign up to them.
And that toothpaste is not getting put back in the tube.
Now That is a powerful cat.
The only way to truly avoid that outcome is with enforceable rules around consent, transparency, and control, letting drivers see exactly what’s being collected, who it’s going to, and giving them a real way to say no. That, or skip the connected car entirely and drive something that isn’t quietly reporting back every time you hit the brakes.
Yeah none of that’s gonna happen anytime soon. When my 16 year old car bites the dust my next car will be another one from that same era. I’m not letting big brother know everything about me and jack up my insurance rates for the privilege of being spied on.
I totally get that sentiment, but there have been significant safety improvements in the last 20 years. Your chances of escaping serious injury in an accident are a lot better with a 2025 car than a 2005.
I have a 2024 and I don’t like that it’s probably sharing data, but I specifically didn’t get an older used car because they’re much less safe. I pay $90 for full coverage for two drivers in Denver without the telematics app discount.
Are you threatening higher insurance rates for someone who wants to drive an older car, in the name of safety?
Sounds like insurance companies punish drivers who can’t afford/don’t want new cars with higher rates, while using safety as a scapegoat.
Leave your mobile phone at home as it knows when you’re driving, speed, acceleration, routes, times. Then you have the CCTV on the roads tracking your every move with your licence plate and facial recognition.
And when you get home turn off the smart TV, smart fridge, smart dishwasher, doorbell cameras, Alexa’s, Google’s. These devices aren’t for our convenience primarily; they’re built to collect our valuable data about our living habits.
Digitally connected electricity, gas and water meters all monitor our usage thus working out our lifestyle patterns and habits. Even smart lightbulbs have the capacity to snoop on our private lives.
From the moment we wake up to turning off the light these connected devices quietly gather data about us innocuously… even when we sleep (phones monitoring breathing sounds).
You can get “smart” devices that do not sell your data, but they are less common and they can be hard to find when shopping. You may not get a choice about “smart” meters, but you may be able to obfuscate your electrical usage with batteries. However, if the batteries have an internet connection they’ll probably sell your data.
Amen. We all drive cars older than 2015, and I’ve gone against anything newer.
The other issue is all those Flock cameras all over our state and surrounding areas, is almost impossible to not be tracked. I didn’t consent to those being used by or municipal or city.
I’m sick of being data points on a spreadsheet!!
I’m so happy my city took down our flock cameras
And this is why I would never own a vehicle made after 2006.
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