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Insurance Companies Try Out Auto Black Boxes
tekiegreg writes "It looks like the first black box test for auto insurance companies is underway. While this may be a privacy issue, it can also make better drivers out of everyone if insurance rates are adjustable based on the way everyone drives. This was covered on Slashdot before however this seems to be one of the first workups, that can even include tests on speed and braking, not just location."
I thought this was a good idea, but then I remembered: "I'm in my 20's and I drive a Camaro". Bad news.
I wouldn't mind if my driving safety was monitored for lower rates but I wouldn't want my speed watched ;)
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/08/10/16 49252&tid=158&tid=126
/. subscription. This exact same insurance company and program has been covered before (past 30 days).
This is why I didn't renew my
Who are you kidding...this is going to turn into another way for them to raise rates and drop people. Sort of like health insurance won't cover some people unless they can pass a physical or charge inordinate amounts of money if you are a bit overweight.
The first time they clock you doing anything over 75 or 80 mph they'll probably be sending you notices. They start sensing sharp breaking and wild turns you may just find yourself without insurance. Chris Rock once said it should be called "in case shit" because you have in case shit happens. And you don't exactly get your money back if you don't. Now they'll see the shit coming and drop you before they have to make a payoff.
"Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb."
What it can do, is force everyone into driving with a black box. Driving without one will become prohibitively expensive, even though the statistics will show that with/without doesn't really affect the actual numbers.
Insurance is about getting you to pay for something that won't ever likely happen... want me to prove it? Keep having stupid accidents, and see if they don't drop you.
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
At least not the ones who will be able to afford the extra $1,000 or so every six months that will be eventually charged to drivers who don't get the "discount" for turning over the data.
One CPU cycle wasted on digital restrictions management is ONE TOO MANY.
Company spokesman William Perry says use of the auto data recorder will not be mandatory for Progressive customers.
"The key thing for us regarding the privacy aspect is the program is completely voluntary. It's not imposed on anybody," he said.
Ha... How much longer will it take before it becomes compulsory?
Regardless, this is still not as bad as Intelligent Speed Adaptation (ISA), where we could one day see full control of speed on our vehicles:
ISA info
As a 21 year old male who loves cars and driving, the future looks bleak.
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it can also make better drivers out of everyone if insurance rates are adjustable based on the way everyone drives.
Is that a troll?
Also, if there was a microchip in my tongue that raised our medical insurance rates when ate a burrito, we'd also be healthier. Or perhaps some sort of camera system in the kitchen that the insurance companies could randomly monitor to verify our mandatory meal plans.
Now whoa, i'm not saying that you HAVE to put the microchip in your tongue, i'm just saying that you don't qualify for the $4000/year TongueChip(tm) discount unless you do it. Also, in completely unrelated news, trial lawyers have forced us to raise your insurance rates by exactly $4000\year.
perhaps that's how they got old?
cheers,
Erick
www.brainglass.com
feed your brain!
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Why must the poster, include commas, all over, the place?
Comma abuse is something that afflicts lots of high-school to college grads. I went to rehab for 2 years, and it was the best thing that ever happened to me.
It sound like the box just plugs in to the stardart OBD-II port found on all new (1996+) cars. If these things take off, I wonder how long until someone makes a box to spoof the signals? Though I am pretty sure that would count as insurance fraud.
If you're doing 65 in a 35 without some sort of GPS unit and a GIS system where it knows the roads and the speed limits? Yea sure, I went 65mph on this day and time, but if you dont know whether I was on a highway or a residential street, piss off! How does it know when you run a red light (if you dont speed up for the little bit)? It cant. Unless it has some GPS system incorporated. And at that rate, they'll know where I was going, where I parked my car, for how long - in other words, big brother will be a corporation and not the government.
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
From TFA: " Progressive says it will use the data only for potential discounts and not to penalize customers whose devices reveal risky driving habits."
Of course, when they do their modelling for the next year, they'll take into account the predicted number of "safe" drivers and "risky" drivers. Given their desired profit levels and the discounts for safe drivers, they'll just adjust rates accordingly for everyone else. Guess which way rates will go to compensate for the discounts?
I'm not saying this is a bad thing (hey, it's capitalism), but to phrase it as "no penalty" for bad drivers (and good drivers who refuse to enter the program) is a bit of a misnomer.
-- Fugacity: Confusing chemists since 1908
Problem is, the most annoying driving habits wouldn't be detected by this device. Backing up traffic by driving 25 in a 35 MPH zone, for example, will only look like someone driving an acceptable speed, despite the fact that such situations are just as likely to cause an accident as driving too fast. Not using a turn-signal probably won't be detected by the device either. Nor would people who pull into the right hand turn only lane even when they intend to go straight, preventing you from making a legal right-on-red turn. As well, the device wouldn't watch for knuckle-heads who never turn on their lights after dark, or when it's raining severely.
I've posted this to a forum I run for actuaries - the mathematical types who price insurance. I won't post a link as I'd rather not have the fame. But it will be interesting to see what they have to say
However, in the article, Charles Samuelson makes a point that is well known when it comes to pricing insurance. Progressive is basically selecting the cream of the crop for their clients. That means more money for them (less claims probably), and less for other insurance companies. So the other insurance companies are forced to start underwriting for this as well. Pretty soon, you're screwed because all the insurance companies have to take it into account to remain competitive.
Think that's only a vague thing? At one point nobody priced life insurance by whether or not you smoked. In fact, it was probably only about 30 years ago they started doing that. Now of course, they have two sets of prices - those that smoke and those that don't.
In short, you'd better get used to the idea of having black boxes installed in your car, and having it taken into account on your insurance. It's profitable for the insurance companies, so it's coming to a policy near you.
Life Insurance in Canada
Most new cars already already have a black box. It records things like acceleration level, braking inputs and vehicle speed.
So far as I know, it only holds data for a short time, but if you are involved in an accident, the data can (and has been) accessed by law enforcement.
something to think about?
http://request-header.info
" 2005 "I'm sorry, the black box says you were doing 60 in a 55 zone"
2006 I'm sorry, the black box says you violated the TandC that said you would not drive for more than 2.5 hours without a 30 minute rest break"
2007 "I'm sorry, the black-box says you were doing 55.0001 in a 55 zone. Haha!"
Viz, "acceptable" behaviour would be socially engineered.
Xix.
"Everything is adjustable, provided you have the right tools"
That means the little old lady driving 35 in the left lane on the highway will save a ton of money as she nearly (or really) kills dozens of people a day.
The black box will think she's the perfect driver.
- Adam L. Beberg - The Cosm Project - http://www.mithral.com/
I disagree with you. The major cause of accidents is people passing only on the left. Here in the US, everyone rigidly stays in the right hand lane, except to pass. And after they have passed, the move over to the right again.
It's a hazard, because to get around a car, you have to always switch a lane. If I'm in the right hand lane, and I'm going 30 MPH faster than another car, it's dangerous to have to change lanes to get around him. If drivers here in the states would just ignore the rules about staying in the right hand lane except to pass, then when I overtake a slow driver on the right, 50% of the time I wouldn't have to change a lane at all.
Our highways would be much safer with less lane changing, and we can only accomplish that by making drivers in the US comfortable with driving continuously in the left hand lane. God knows they never do that now.
No weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men.-Ronald Reagan
Putting a camera in your house is not a violation of your rights if you agree to it. And it's not a violation of your rights for any insurance company refuse to cover you if you don't have one. Considering how crappy it would be not to have home insurance, such a refusal would almost make it a requirement to have a camera in your house, recording all your actions without any explicit violation of your rights.
All that would be necessary to make this situation just like the car insurance/black box case is to have the government mandate that you must have house insurance. Then, without any violation of your rights (because you're voluntarily waiving them, after all), no more privacy for you. And there's nothing wrong with this; after all, owning a house is a privilege, not a right.
Will require GPS to be effective, and that means they know where you're driving. If your work happens to be near a "bad" intersection for accidents, your rate goes up, even if you have a perfect record.
Now, that's good for the insurance company, as they charge more for higher risk areas (or drivers). But it's bad for the pool, i.e. us.
It will be encouraged, it will be used, it will create profit and reduce "losses" (i.e. compensation), and it will spread like wildfire until it is effectively or actually mandatory.
In addition, how many minutes do you figure it will be before "recorded speed and GPS data" becomes "remotely reported speed and GPS data" becomes "transmitted directly to the nearest CHP car," without, of course, the context that a police officer observing the scene would see. Just numbers.
You know, swerving and accelerating to avoid an accident becomes a speeding ticket. Running a red light to avoid an accident could cost you your license. Running a broken red light at 4am with no traffic could do the same. No one will care about your story, the computer shows just what you did. Heck, it probably won't even require (allow) a court appearance.
I'm getting tired of even debating these points, which is why the bad guys always seem to win. They have an inexhaustible drive to control everyone else all the time that keeps them awake at night. They never seem to run out of energy and they never seem to run out of recruits.
And its always the same argument, over and over, every time. You can win the argument ("know your customer" banking laws) and while you're sleeping off the effort they pass the same damned thing again.
The utility argument is a loss, you can justify ANY incursion for that one. Mandatory diet and exercise, 24-hour monitoring, there can be no dividing line from the POV of utility.
The "license" argument isn't an argument for monitoring, it's an argument against public roads.
Just remember, those of you who think it can't hurt you, when it's your turn, the rest of us sure as heck aren't going to speak up for you.
A very good point. The blackbox assumes bad behavior from the very start. After all, they're not going to give you the good rates unless you can prove you've been good. So if you can't prove you've been good-- the lack of a speeding ticket or screwed up fender will should tell you that. Isn't that why your damn rates go up? --then your aren't entitled to the "special" rate. I tend to agree with the parent here... This is either a very flawed study in human psychology or nothing more than a sad profit tool, probably a bit of both.
I mean one person is monitored being good, the other one is not monitored being good, but penalized. Kinda ironic in a society of presumed innocense. Frankly, I'll drop any insurance company that pulls this crap.
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Don't cruise at 65 mph in the left lane when traffic is flowing at 75+ and I won't tailgate you.
I'm too lazy to compose a creative sig.
Here's my immediate reaction: if it can say how fast I was going, and how I was using the controls, and where I am, it can know if I'm speeding or working the controls in a piss-poor fashion.
However, how can it identify the person who is speeding through traffic, whipping in and out of different lanes and driving right up on other cars (very dangerous on a crowded freeway, and very common here in LA) versus the person who is speeding along in a single lane of a winding road with no other traffic within sight?
In other words, without proximity data (as is, your proximity to other cars) -- and let's be honest, even with that data -- it's always going to come down to a judgement call based on less than perfect knowledge of the circumstances.
Or maybe I'm full of crap. It's hard to tell some days.
Every time I go to work, once I settle into the flight deck, there's one black box recording every movement of the controls, and another recording every scrap of conversation. In the event of incidents, this data is available to investigators for analysis. That's the way it is in aviation, and now techology has made it economical to apply this principle to cars on the road. It's long overdue. btw, the 'black boxes' are actually flourescent orange, makes it a lot easier to find them in a wrecked vehicle.
If you want privacy, go take your vehicle and drive it on private roads. The history in aviation shows, data recorders are a GOOD THING. When there are incidents, the recorders have records of what happened. People learn from that data, it reduces accident rates, and helps designers make safer vehicles. Sometimes it can be used to identify liability and responsibility. Race cars are the same, much knowledge has been gained from post race data analysis, especially with regards to incidents.
If your data recorder shows you are not safe on the public roads, and that results in loss of insurance, hence ability to use the public road system, couldn't happen to a more appropriate person. This would take less than 1% of drivers off the road, but would increase road safety by orders of magnitude. Most people are responsible drivers on the road, but there's a very small number that seem to think the 'rules of the road' are there to be broken. They account for many thousands of fatalities yearly.
There is a time and a place to 'pick the fight' on privacy, this is not one of them. The public road system is a public resource, with zero expectation of privacy, and a very large expectation of responsibility. Data recorders are a good way to enforce that responsibility, because one look at accident statistics will confirm, there are way to many drivers on the road that just dont understand the concept of responsibility.
Then Geico started doing business in NJ. I filled a form online, got a computer generated quote automatically, I followed up with a call that was answered immediatelly and in about 30 minutes I had a new policy that was $500/year lower than NJ Cure and approx $1000 lower than my previous insurance. So I guess I really did "save a bunch of money by switching to Geico"
I guess the rest of the country is already used to this, but for us, insurance handicapped NJersians, this kind of service is like the Second Coming...
If con is the opposite of pro, is Congress the opposite of progress?