Big Brother In Your Front Seat

Rick Zeman writes "Would you give up your privacy in your car to save a few bucks on your auto insurance? 'Safe' drivers who plug an electronic device into their vehicles will be then eligible for a discount on their insurance. They say, '...the device constantly tracks car speed. By comparing that with a clock in the TripSense device, the device figures how far the car goes, mapping it against the time of day. At the end of each policy term, the customer would download the data and see what discount he or she would get. Customers can see all their data before deciding to send it to Progressive, and can decide not to send it -- and not get extra discounts.' I wonder how soon it will be that everyone has one except those resigned to paying extra as with grocery 'convenience' cards."

Comments

No

[Lord Grey]

Would you give up your privacy in your car to save a few bucks on your auto insurance? ... the device constantly tracks car speed ...

To make this as easy as possible for insurance company representatives (or any other representatives of big business and government) to understand:

Stay the f**k out of my life.

Re:No

[maximilln]

You know that, to save the children, eventually these things will be mandatory by law.

Re:No

[Dr Caleb]

I second that. They are there to provide me with a service. They can judge how much that will cost me by how much I cost them in the past, not how much I might cost them in the future.

I can decide if I'm willing to pay their outragous prices and contribute to their record profits (last year for example). Stay the hell out of my life.

Re:No

[jridley]

Easy enough. Don't do business with companies that do things you don't like. But don't complain when you have to pay more than your neighbor because he's proved he's a good driver, while you're an unknown risk.

Re:No

[cubicledrone]

car insurance is privately owned

It was. Now it is mandated, therefore it is a tax, and therefore it is government. That means we can bypass the whole "well, it's a private company so they can deep fry your rights in wombat shit" argument.

Re:No

[base3]

You really think this will result in discounts for good drivers? The "proven good drivers'" premiums might dip a little at first, but ultimately, they will use the chilling effect of having this device to increase the money they make from good drivers, while charging a premium for privacy for those who can afford it.

Re:No

[gfxguy]

But what about when they all require them?

It's an interesting dilema, and it's easy to say to just pick another company...

When they came for Progressive, I said I didn't have Progressive, so I did nothing.

When they came for State Farm, I said I didn't have State Farm, so I did nothing....

Etc., etc....

Until... then they came for Metropolitan, and there were no other companies to turn to...

Obviously, I think, we are beginning to understand that in order to continue having certain privelages, because so many people violate those privelages, we are going to have to accept enforcement of the proper use of those privelages and pay the penalties when we don't. Speed traps, red light cameras, black boxes... Sure, I know it's not the government... yet.

I could be flip about it and say "well, if you don't speed then why would you object?" But I won't, because we all know it doesn't end there. On the other hand, with so many people violating rules and laws, costing lives and money, something like this is inevitable.

Re:No

[JAgostoni]

At least they said it was optional. But then again, that just means they'll raise your rates and the "discounted" rates will but what you WERE paying before you decided not to install the little black box.

Re:No

[riptide_dot]

You: Stay the f**k out of my life.
InsureCo: No problem. Have a nice day and good luck driving your car without insurance.

Me: Thanks, it's very easy to drive without insurance. It's not really harder than driving with insurance, actually. Now, getting pulled over without insurance, that's a different story. Still relatively easy, but expensive. I'll go talk to company B who will give me discounts based on my lack of accidents, lack of tickets within the last three years, and the fact that I purchased other insurance policies through them as well. Have a nice day!

InsuranceCo: Wait, come back! We don't want to lose your business, we just wanted to make more money from you by proving that you speed despite your clean record!

Insurance Companies live and die with statistics. The one they're playing with now I'll bet says that even their "best" drivers that don't get speeding tickets and get into accidents are still speeding, but not getting caught. I'd imagine that most of their customers speed from time to time, so this is an easier way of increasing their rates without having to rely on the CHP or local law enforcement to catch them. I'm not against people wanting to do this, but I imagine that a whole lot of people that try this will be disappointed in the end because their premiums don't go anywhere but up because only the most cautious drivers actually go the speed limit or slower ALL THE TIME. Most people speed, and the insurance companies probably have the statstics to prove it.

Bottom line: a large company that is in the business of making money will NEVER offer incentives to their customers that causes them to lose money somehow. That's bad business.

Re:No

[darksaber]

To make this as easy as possible for insurance company representatives (or any other representatives of big business and government) to understand: Stay the f**k out of my life.

Is now a good time to say, "Who is forcing you to use these devices? This plan doesn't even force to report results after you check them."

Ignoring slippery slopes for a moment, the insurance company is trying to "prove" that you aren't a problem case waiting to happen. And why wouldn't you want to let the crazier drivers pay for the risk? Do you really like subsidizing their rates? Of course, reading the posts in other articles here, slashdot readers are pretty crazy drivers (e.g. passing at 100mph driving on the wrong side of the street) so maybe I'll be mobbed in a minute.

Also, they aren't trying to collect much information at the moment, but I imagine it would be a lot harder to justify the increased benefits of full tracking logs vs just speed logs. That, and for the non-tinfoil crowd, the detail to really recreate an accident would probably take way to much storage unless it was only the most recent data. The tinfoil crowd isn't reading this anyway.

P.S. For those who worry about it being sub-poenaed and self-incrimination, I agree it shouldn't be but it probably will. I still don't feel sorry for those who actually cause accidents by being deliberately reckless time and time again and try to hide it though.

Re:No

[SnapShot]

With all due respect, how many "good" drivers do you see on the road on a daily basis. When was the last time you saw a vehical go the speed limit (not 5 to 10 mph over, but the actual posted speed limit?)

Okay, I do it occassionally just to piss-off tailgaters...

Anyway, IMOSFHO, the real danger on the road is people who pass on the right, tailgaters, people who don't use turn signals, and people who generally act like asshats. Speed is just a multiplier for other stupid behavior. When are we going to get the black box that detects assholes?

Re:No

[sweetooth]

Well the whole reason you have insurance is so that if something bad happens while driving etc you don't have to foot the whole bill yourself. This seems much more like a tactic for the insurance companies to get out of liability should you be in an accident.

Say you are in one, the insurance company then pulls out your data and says: You drive an average of 3 mph over the speed limit based on the data you have provided for the last couple of years and that puts you in violation of our terms so you're on your own buddy.

While it may reduce the costs for some customers initially there is a point when all insurance companies will require it (assuming consumers don't complain and it's likely they won't). Then there will be no reason to give any one a price cut for using it and they can get out of paying for more claims as so many people violate the speed limit laws etc.

Then again maybe I'm just paranoid when it comes to corporations, privacy, etc.

Re:No

[Mistlefoot]

How can this work.......

I believe most accidents happen in cities, and likely at speeds under 50mph. What good does this do for an insurance company to see that I often drive at 55mph or 60mph when I could quite likely be highway driving.

45mph in a 30mph zone is far more dangerous than 65mph in a 60mph zone. How can the device KNOW the speed limit when compared with the speed driven?

Re:No

[cubicledrone]

It's not a tax

Government mandated payment = tax.

it's only mandated for people that own cars

Sales tax is only mandated for people who buy things.

Re:No

[cubicledrone]

In other cases (such as civil suits) the government may mandate that you relinquish damages to another party. That is also clearly not a tax.

Straw man. Different branch of government. Totally different concept. Judgements are not mandates.

Everyone should have one

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder how soon it will be that everyone has one

I wonder how long till someone hacks it to get a discount on their insurance.
Oh and does it run Linux?

no

[Triumph The Insult C]

what's next after that? save a few bucks on health insurance if i walk around with a camera showing i don't smoke?

it's all the lawyers fault anyways. go put the damn black box in their car and see how they like it

That would RULE

[ToadMan8]

Mine would say I do 6 MPH below the speed limit at every given time and I never tailgate and always stop for little old ladies in the crosswalk... Regardless of my 110 MPH habits.
Or if I'm going to be crazy for a little bit I'll just deactivate it.
Remember a tip of security of a device... if you can get your hands on it, especially in your house or garage for a matter of months, it's as good as hacked. Other, non-tech savvy people may think otherwise about it though.

Great Idea!

[Laivincolmo]

I would gladly install one of these in my car. It would provide hard evidence in the case of an accident or unlawful speeding ticket.
Hey... maybe they should make them mandatory in police cars to stop all those speeding cops... Anyone else notice how cops are immune to the speed limit?

Not if your kids drive

[holden caufield]

Does anyone even remotely believe that children (let's say those under 25 still covered uner their parent's insurance) drive as responsibly as they might tell their parents?

do NOT do this, and do NOT support it

[acroyear]

Because once its in there and shows positive statistics, the government might mandate it.

And once THAT happens, it becomes information they could subpoena.

So you get into an accident that you *know* was the other guys fault, but your little black box says you were speeding slightly at the time, and the courts could quickly decide that you really were partially at fault and force your insurance company to pony up (and thus increase your rates) where now the other guys insurance would have to pick it up.

Information you are not in control of will be used to control you. Better it simply not exist at all.

Re:do NOT do this, and do NOT support it

[selderrr]

there's one flaw in your reasoning : your little black box says you were speeding slightly.

Now, let's start with the assumption that the device works properly. (if you start to question that, you can't have any reasonable discussion anymore) So you were speeding. So you were breaking the law. So you were at fault. So you do deserve to be considered part of the problem.

I do agree that this device is bad because of privacy issues, but the argument you're bringing up is a dead argument used by many : But sir, I WAS ONLY A LITTLE BIT AT FAULT, AND HIM THERE WAS WAY OVER IT

Who's going to draw that line ? How much can you surpass the speed limit ? 2% ? 10% ? Some say 50% depending on weather conditions. Who judges these weather conditions ? Does the forecast have a subsection "the weather is prefect to go 12.7% over the speedlimit today" ?

My point : once you admit you were at fault, you have nothing more to say about not being guilt at all. I'm not saying that you're the complete problem, but at least for gods sake ACKNOWLEDGE YOUR ERROR AND BEAR THE CONSEQUENCES. Even if that implies your insurance goes up 10% (hey, maybe next time you won't be speeding anymore and save a kids life ?)

Many people live by a standard "you did more wrong than me, so you're to blame". I have kids age 5 and 3, and they do this all the time 'okay, i broke a glass, but he broke 2 and did it first'. I don't care what the other did. You'll both get reprimanded independently of the others.

It's called growing up. Try and get some.


Note : sorry if this comment was flammable, but the kids were annoying today (heatwave overhere so they can't play outside and get obnoxious to get at me) and I burned all my fuel trying to stay reasonable.

Re:do NOT do this, and do NOT support it

[yabos]

Who says that speeding would have any fault in the accident? The accident could very well happen no matter what speed you were going.

You can't say that just because you were speeding that it was partially your fault. What if someone was speeding up behind you really fast and you punched the gas to lessen the impact? Your speed would probably be over the limit but you actually saved yourself some possible injury.

Again, what if you are on a 4 lane(2 either way) highway and you were passing someone and they chaned lanes and side swiped you? How is that any of your fault because you were going 5 or 10 or more over the limit? They should be able to judge your speed and know when it's safe to change lanes.

This box is nothing but another way for insurance companies to get out of paying you. They would no doubt have a clause in their agreement stating that if you were speeding according to their box that they wouldn't have to pay you squat which is BS.

Re:do NOT do this, and do NOT support it

[acroyear]

thing is, there's over the speed limit, and then there's driving faster than the flow of traffic.

I could easily have been over the speed limit, along with everybody else who drives 70mph on 28 near dulles airport outside DC. so yeah, i'm speeding, but i'm not the traffic risk. the guy doing 90 and changing lanes like he's in Le Mans IS, and if he hits me, its his fault no matter what speed i was doing.

in fact, in that circumstance (VERY common near DC) if I was doing the 55 speed limit, i would be presenting even MORE of a risk to getting hit by mr. 90mph.

so i'm not saying i wasn't speeding, i'm saying i was not a threat to the flow of traffic which the other individual was. should i be penalized because I was trying NOT to be a threat to traffic?

speeding is, in spite of everything they try to do with their fucking cameras and crap, a relative crime, not an absolute, and any attempt to make it an absolute simply causes traffic to STOP at the places they do it at, or penalizes the poor and middle class while the rich pay the fines (without point penalty or chance of losing their license) as if it was just a "tax in order to have the right to speed".

its a cheap tax to them.

i'm bitter about this because I got a camera-ticket a few weeks back because I 1) was driving the same speed as everybody else, but 2) had backed off just enough so that I was effectively driving "alone" (nobody near me at the time). I do this because I can't trust the other drivers to not change lanes without looking (i've had dozens of near-misses because people suck) so i match speeds with the "packs" but considerably behind them.

This means, of course, that I can get picked off like any prey not hiding among the herd. I get penalized because I was trying to remain in a safe situation where i wasn't getting swallowed up in a pack of cars full of drivers who can't drive for shit.

Re:Entrapment

[wwest4]

Isn't entrapment when you are goaded into doing something illegal you wouldn't otherwise do?

This is part of the trend toward automated mass transit. Suck all the joy/autonomy out of driving by constraining the ways you can legally drive, and after a while there will be no "freedom" in having your own car. You may as well get on the subway with a toy driving wheel and make vroom-vroom sounds.

Re:Entrapment

[base3]

Finally--someone gets it. A "discount" for having the device is really a surcharge for not having it.

Why this idea is crap.

[GoRK]

The only standard way this data is available on vehicles is via OBD-II. Such dataloggers are already commonly available and used by mechanics to diagnose problems, but here is the real problem -- you could dupe them VERY esily. It would take any sensible programmer with a copy of the (free) standards less than a day to create some kind of simulator that you plug the device into instead of your car.

The only real benefit I see to this problem is that if you call them out on it, you'll probably be able to get the 'safe' rate without having to plug the thing into your own car.

there are already database records of speeding

[gnat_x]

any person who has an ez-pass which is the new trend at least on the east coast is already having their travels through toll booths recorded in a database.

if you enter the NJ turnpike at the south end and drive to the north end, its a simple equation to figure out if your average speed was higher than the speed limit.

there are ez-pass scanners everywhere, including buildings all over manhatten. but everyone in the NYC area has them because it makes their lives and their commutes easier (as the name would suggest) and cheaper.

people don't seem to have a problem with those things being recorded if it means they don't have to pay more/ wait in line.

Re:Entrapment

[cubicledrone]

Ding! We have a winner! :)

The grocery stores charge up to a SIXTY PERCENT PENALTY for not handing over an address, social security number, etc. Why not auto insurance? And why not say, 150%?

Re:I doubt this will take off

[mc6809e]

Especially if they decide that you should pay more for excessive speeding. How many people actually obey the speed limit all the time?

It may not even matter to the insurance company.

Seriously. An insurance company looks at all these things statistically. If there is no statistical relationship between speeding and how much they have to payout on a claim, they aren't going to charge extra for speeding.

And it makes business sense, too.

Suppose speeders showed no difference in their odds of getting into an accident, yet Big Insurance Corp A charges extra money for people with speeding tickets.

Big Insurance Corp B discovers during routine data-mining that there is no relationship between speeding and payouts and so charges less for insuring speeders.

At some point Corp B has all the "speeders" business while A is out of luck because they over-charged.

Profitable insurance companies look at all kinds of things that might not seem relevent like credit reports, car color, and profession. Yet, when they dump all this information into their systems they find correlations. And these correlations allow them to more accurately price insurance for people.

Those companies that use personal judgements like, ALL SPEEDERS ARE A BIG RISK -- CHARGE $$$!!! aren't going to be able to compete if their judgements are inconsistant with statistical reality.

discount vs surcharge

[Animaether]

That depends..

If all my apples cost 20ct/piece for everyone, has for many years, whatever.
And you fill in a form that gets you a bonus card, and entitles you to get them at 15ct/piece.

Does that mean you got a discount ?
Or does that mean everybody else got a surcharge ?

Considering everybody else is still paying their 20ct/piece, as they have in the past, there is no change in the situation for them.
There is, however, for you. You can get them cheaper. You are getting.. a discount.

The situation you're talking about is this..

Apples used to cost 20ct/piece
Then I raise the cost to 25ct/piece, whilst introducing the bonus card. You fill in the info, I get you the bonus card, and you can once again get your apples for 20ct/piece.
Everybody else, however, would be paying the 25ct/piece.
In THAT case.. everybody else is getting a surcharge, whilst nothing changes for you.

Of course you could go halfway. Up the price to 22.5 or 17.5 for those with the card - in which case everybody else would get a surcharge - albeit a 'minor' one, whilst you would still get a discount - albeit a 'minor' one.

That said...
Of course insurance companies will raise the prices for those who opt not to get it. That's been the case for almost every piece of technology, though they're usually smart enough to make this a gradual change.
I.e. at the introduction of airbags, they didn't just raise the price insanely immediately - just gradually, until the time came where most cars do have an airbag - therefore not having an airbag makes you a clear minority.. a minority which, compared to the others, is a liability.

How does the device know

[Tenebrious1]

The progressive device doesn't include a GPS. So how's the device know if I'm doing 55 down a highway, or 55 down the adjacent local road blowing through red lights?

Re:How does the device know

[earthforce_1]

And that time it recorded me doing 75 MPH, I was vacationing in Montana.

Fixed speed limits are a crock anyway, how does it tell the difference between driving on an icy covered road in a blizzard, and a clear day with dry roads and unlimited visibility, with no traffic? Driving 50 in the first case may be suicide, yet it is legal. Doing 50 on the open highway in clear conditions, you are a traffic impediment.

Data Context?

[slackerboy]

According to the article: In Minnesota, where the highway speed limit is 70 mph, drivers who go over 75 less than 0.1% of the time get an extra 5% discount.

So what happens with the guy that always drives 60, but only drives in the 25MPH school zones? Data without context is worthless!

Plus, on a $1200 annual insurance bill, you'd only save $60 by giving up your privacy...

It's not a tax

[SuperMario666]

You still have a choice among insurance companies. Choose one that doesn't snoop into your business.

Interesting.

[Hanna's Goblin Toys]

So if you're going 16 in a 15mph zone, and I drive into the side of your car by running a stop sign while going 15mph, you're at fault?

Awesome. Where do you live?

Re:Ahead of the curve

[Leebert]

I'm already ahead of the curve...the automotive and insurance industries had already squeezed the last drop out of this turnip.

Funny, I'd argue that you've already given up and they've beaten you.