Stalling Cars Via OnStar

Lauren Weinstein writes to tell us that GM will be installing OnStar systems on almost 1.7 million 2009-model cars that will allow law enforcement (or anyone who cracks the system) to remotely shut down vehicles. Here is the AP's writeup, which like most MSM coverage doesn't mention any privacy implications.

Comments

It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[daveschroeder]

...the implication being that it just slams on the brakes or kills the engine or both.

From TFA:

OnStar would call police and tell them a stolen car's whereabouts.

Then, if officers see the car in motion and judge it can be stopped safely, they can tell OnStar operators, who will send the car a signal via cell phone to slow it to a halt.

"This technology will basically remove the control of the horsepower from the thief," Huber said. "Everything else in the vehicle works. The steering works. The brakes work."

GM is still exploring the possibility of having the car give a recorded verbal warning before it stops moving. A voice would tell the driver through the radio speakers that police will stop the car, Huber said, and the car's emergency flashers would go on.

"If the thief does nothing else it will coast to a stop. But they can drive off to the side of the road," Huber said.

And from TFR (where "R" stands for "rant"):

The claim is that owners will have to give permission first for this capability to be enabled. Bull. I don't care what OnStar's privacy policy says, if the technical capability for this function is present, OnStar will have no practical choice but to comply when faced with a law enforcement demand or court order, whether or not owner "permission" was ever granted.

It is completely technically feasible for this system to need to be enabled in order for it to work. For example, with BMW Assist, BMW's OnStat-like service, equipment is physically disabled in the car if the user does not subscribe to a service.

This argument appears predicated on the belief that even if a customer doesn't voluntarily and willingly "opt in", that it can still somehow be used by police or hackers. I'm sorry, but that's simply not how it works.

Further, OnStar can currently be used to unlock vehicles. Why isn't that an "irresistible target for hackers"?

It's impossible to hack OnStar? Would you bet your life on that?

Um, no, because I wouldn't have to, nor would anyone else who opts in to the service?

And how long will it be before such systems are mandated, one might wonder?

Ah, my old friend, the slippery slope. Long time, no see!

This is no different than Lojack, which can also, in theory, be "activated" when a user chooses to have the service, in the same way this could be.

And if you don't believe GM's clearly stated privacy policies, which state, in short, that "OnStar will release information about a vehicle only for marketing research, to protect the rights, property, of safety of any person, in exigent circumstances, to prevent misuse of their service, when legally required to do so or when subject to a valid court order, or in various other circumstances", then you probably shouldn't buy a GM vehicle.

Good thing buying GM vehicles isn't mandatory, and GM isn't a government agency, huh?

(And of course -- and I didn't look at this at first -- because there is editorializing about how the "MSM" doesn't mention privacy implications, I'm not surprised to see it's posted by kdawson.)

Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[PhxBlue]

Ah, my old friend, the slippery slope. Long time, no see!

That's not slippery slope; it's precedent.

Look at seatbelts or airbags. Maybe you can remember a time before they were federally mandated. Even the middle tail light on your back window is put there by government mandate.

I'm not saying that seatbelts or airbags are bad things, don't get me wrong; but ideally, a government wouldn't need to tell manufacturers how to build their cars -- people would buy cars with those features because they want a car that's safe. Likewise, I'm not arguing that the ability to hit a kill switch on a stolen car is a bad thing ... but as we've seen with everything from the Taser to the PATRIOT Act, the government will do as much as it can get away with, with the power it's given.

Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[daveschroeder]

Yes, I remember (barely) the shoulder belt, the air bag, and the center high mounted stop lamp, better known as the third brake light.

I also remember the arguments about shoulder belts and air bags killing people, and about how the CHMSL destroyed the aesthetics of the rear of a vehicle. Except that it was easily proven that the benefits of shoulder belts, air bags, and third brake lights outweighed any drawbacks.

What if a controlled remote kill of a vehicle under police supervision that has been reported stolen or is the subject of a court order has the same results? Returning stolen properly safely, preventing high speed police chases and death?

Same thing with Tasers. Tasers are statistically harmless, and a hell of a lot less harmless than a number of other ways of subduing a suspect, including lethal means. Whether Tasers are overused is a different question altogether, but being tased is a much better alternative than being forcibly subdued by any number of other means. Tasers are designed to be a safer and non-lethal ("non-lethal" in weapons terms doesn't mean "never, ever lethal or having any contributing effect on a possible lethal scenario whatsoever" - and please, don't link me to your favorite article or sob story about how oh-so-dangerous Tasers are: given their use, they are far, far less dangerous than the means they replaced).

And same with the PATRIOT Act. It was pretty much universally agreed that a lot of older laws needed updating. Given the size and scope of PATRIOT, only very, very small portions of it were controversial. Nearly all of the rest of it was benign or viewed as sensible by most people. Some provisions have been called into Constitutional question. But you don't throw the baby out with the bathwater, as we do when we imply that all of the PATRIOT Act rises to this level of controversy, when in reality it is very small portions of it, on the whole.

I don't fundamentally disagree with the government using the power it has, using anything it is given, and, inasmuch as it can be anthropomorphized, always "wanting more". But is this because of the evil or corruption or totalitarianism that is sometimes implied by such assertions, or because many in government simply use all the tools at their disposal? Governments and police agencies can do a lot more with vehicles, telephones, cameras, computers, databases, networks, Tasers, spike strips, and all manner of things than they can without. Technology is always enabling and is often a force multiplier.

Government mandates, and government in general, are not all sinister, nor are they all roses. But we should look at them on balance.

Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[meringuoid]

From TFA:

OnStar operators, who will send the car a signal via cell phone to slow it to a halt

So: they will send the car a signal. And then it will slow to a halt.

What part of this doesn't sound like 'remotely shutting down vehicles' to you? I had my engine fuck out on me about a year ago - cambelt snapped. All the power went away. Electricals worked, steering, brakes, so I could pull over to the hard shoulder just on inertia and phone for help, but you know what? I'd call that 'shut down', even though I was still moving. And if I'd been out in the right-hand lane instead of going relatively slowly on the left, I'd have been fucked - stranded out in warp-speed M5 traffic with rapidly dropping velocity trying to get across the carriageway to somewhere safe. And they propose to let someone have the authority to inflict that on me remotely via a mobile? Sorry. I don't trust anyone that much.

Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[crabpeople]

Hes not arguing that tasers are more deadly than a gun, hes arguing that when tasers were first released they were positioned as an alternative to deadly force - as in used in the same situation a gun would be used. In practice, we see them used as a quick effortless way to subdue someone for whatever reason, be they violent or nonviolent. Its not about the infrequent deaths, its about the perception by law enforcement that taser use is routine.

As long as its not illegal to completely disable these devices I wouldn't have a problem with it in my car, but its a very slippery slope as you alluded to with the seatbelt. The government could simply make it illegal to disable such a system, and next thing you know police are using it to disable cars with offensive bumper stickers (say a darwin fish in the southern USA? chevy loyal cops disabling fords? or just giving a cop an eye he doesnt like).

Police need far less powers not more. It is after all, just a car, and insurance will cover the damages if any. The GPS system and the constant data archiving of your and your routes is a bit more scary than remote disable imho. I would never buy a car that "phoned home" to the manufacturers database with info about where I am at all times.

Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[vertinox]

Ahh so you're one of those intellectually useless "strict Constitutional constructionists" who never seem to FUCKING realize that the way the US Constitution was written and the way the real world works today do not mesh up 100%.

Thats fine and dandy, but at what point did government stop playing by the rules? If the constitution is irrelevant, then why don't we simply ignore it all together.

Is it just a sham to make people think that we have some sort of rule of law for our freedoms? I mean at least when the prohibitionists outlawed alcohol they did so in the proper fashion by an amendment to the constitution.

Simply stating that the government has the authority simply writes them a blank check at this point and AFAIK no one has pointed out a really good reason when this legally changed.

Its easy to kind of point out when people started to ignore the rules though. Jefferson was right in the respect that we should have re-written the constitution from scratch every 20 years or so.

Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[Shakrai]

Hes not arguing that tasers are more deadly than a gun, hes arguing that when tasers were first released they were positioned as an alternative to deadly force - as in used in the same situation a gun would be used. In practice, we see them used as a quick effortless way to subdue someone for whatever reason, be they violent or nonviolent

Thank you! I made this same point back in the discussion about the "don't tase me bro!" kid. The problem is tasers isn't the 1 person out of 10,000,000 that's going to die as a result of being tased. The problem is that the taser has lowered the standard of when to use force.

Forgot about the gun v. taser debate. Would a cop have been willing to use his nightstick on that kid? Yes, he was being a jerk and didn't go prone for them. But would they really have whipped out nightsticks and used them? Not likely. The image of four cops beating up a single college kid with nightsticks wouldn't play very well, now would it?

Ah! But the taser! We can use the taser. It's lowered the standard for when force can be used. And that's a bad thing, imho.

Another taser story that sticks out in my mind was a judge out in California ordering his court officers to tase a defendant who refused to stop speaking when ordered to. Yeah, throw him back in jail for contempt of court, but TASE someone for speaking? Not even screaming and yelling. Speaking! That's bullshit. If I walk up to Dick Cheney and tell him to go "fuck yourself" in a normal tone of voice is that really grounds for his USSS guards to tase you?

Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[hazem]

I know there is this whole list of logical fallacies and I even agree with a lot of them. But I don't put as much stock in dismissing an argument simply because it's a "slippery slope" argument.

I say this because I, myself, have implemented plans where this was exactly the method of getting something done. First get a little feature or control, then use that as wedge to get the full feature or full control I really want. It's not so unusual as you can often hear other people making the same strategic plans for their agenda.

Hell, it's even a common tactic for getting sex. One usually doesn't just rip off his clothes and try to copulate with the nearby female. Success rates are often higher if you're more strategic in your approach. Set the mood; nice dinner and wine; soft lights. Touching and so on... and now I'm sounding like either a Barry White album or that skit from Meaning of Life ("You don't have to go leaping straight for the clitoris like a bull at a gate."). In any case, you often need to guide her down that slippery slope...

Couple that with the very strong tendency of governments (or any organization with power) to stay in power and magnify that power, it's very easy to see that once there is the capability to do something desirable that those in power would make it mandatory to have that capability.

There are many many examples of this and frankly it pretty much invalidates the claim in arguments that a "slippery slope is a logical fallacy". It might not stand up in the theory of pure logic but it certainly is valid in the practice of real life.

Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[Score Whore]

Or perhaps the police would abuse the system. For ... for what exactly?

I dunno. Maybe they want to murder their ex-girlfriend who is running away in her 2009 GM automobile. Or perhaps they want to stalk their ex-girlfriend.

Government officials aren't exactly super human. They are people like everybody else and they will abuse anything they have available to them.

Similarly with this stop button. Instead of a driver speeding away from the police, potentially killing himself or a family in the opposite lane, the chase can come to a quick and safe (for everyone) halt.

In some jurisdictions they have solved this problem by not giving chase. This way citizens could decide which they are more concerned with, an abusive government employee or a crook stealing their car.

Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"

[wizzat]

Because obviously the overseer needs more oversight? What happened to the citizens overseeing the government? What happened to governments serving their citizens? What happened to public servants?

Governments, by nature, take as much power as they can get their grubby hands on. Things like this are dangerously close to living in a police state. Police states do not exist to serve their citizens, but only to collect and consolidate power for some select few.

People putting their foot down and saying "No" is the oversight of the police that you were asking for.

Slippery Slope

[nurb432]

I remember being told 'that will never take place, we are a passive monitoring service' early on when i asked about 'can you shut my car down remtotely'.

Next step is discounts on car insurance if you have one. Then you get penalized by higher rates, then it just becomes required by law, ' for your protection' of course.

Anyone remember how the seat belt laws did the same thing? "They are for your safety".. " cant build a car without one".. "you gotta wear one or you violate the law"..."well, we can only charge you if we stop you for something else nad notice it".. Now they have roadblocks..

Re:Slippery Slope

[Vellmont]

I acknowledge your right to freedom, but at the same time I have no wish to fund your care while you spend 30 years fading to black in a vegetative state because your brain got scrambled in a relatively minor accident.


Then you'd agree that we should ban skydiving, rock climbing, bull riding, car racing, and anything else you might have to "fund your care for 30 years".

What makes you think people having health care gives you the right to start controlling what they do, simply because you also pay for health care? Not wearing a seatbelt is pretty dumb, or at best self destructive. But why don't people have the right to be dumb or self destructive?

People are going to PAY for these cars

[damburger]

Its all well and good complaining that our government/corporate masters are tightening their control over their lives - but they couldn't do that without the cooperation of the masses.

There is no point directing your anger at opportunistic invasions of privacy. Direct your anger at the sheeple happily gambolling into the slaughterhouse. They are the ones that provide said opportunities.

Hacker angle is fun...

[Uksi]

... but law enforcement angle is not so fun and is the real problem. Potential for misuse is huge. There's already enough bored suburban police looking to make up a budget shortfall. I just don't trust local police to remotely stall cars responsibly. Why bother pulling out and putting on the blues when they can call in and stall your car that drove 40mph into an unmarked 35mph zone? Incompetent low-wage OnStar operator disabling the wrong car by accident? They won't care. This is a serious tool--where's the due process?

I can't imagine people wanting to choose vehicles with OnStar with such a "feature."

What does this have to do with PRIVACY?

[pclminion]

You could make the argument that this is a violation of certain rights (although I'm not sure which rights those would be). But PRIVACY? What the hell does the functional status of your motor vehicle have to do with your privacy?

Re:Not only that

[KKlaus]

You're drawing an incorrect parallel to what has been happening with health insurance, and car owners without this feature will be fine. While improvements in the abilities of health insurance companies to predict who is going to get sick have started to make it near impossible for certain people to get health insurance, that's only because those people are literally UNPROFITABLE (as in taking a loss) for the insurance companies. The word unprofitable there is the key though.

Yes, car owners without this feature may be more subject to successful thefts, and therefore LESS profitable than their counterparts with the service, but unlike someone who just found out they have terminal cancer and is looking to get insurance, they are still SOMEWHAT profitable, just less. I assume that they are still profitable, because clearly no one has this service now, yet auto insurers are making money.

So anyhow, whereas some people can't get health insurance because insurers know that they are far too likely to take a big loss on them, people will have an easy time getting auto insurance without this feature because auto insurers will still be able to make money off of them. People without the feature may have to pay more for that insurance, and they can independently decide whether that's what they want to do, but they'll certainly be able to find it.

Re:Not only that

[fractoid]

Enter the classic car. Agreed 110%! My car's a good 18 years newer than your friend's Plymouth, and it does have some transistors in a box under the bonnet for the EFI and electronic ignition, but when it comes down to it, it's still electromechanical, not electronic. The only cars I've driven other than it have been newish (Y2k+ models) that have been choc full of electronics and friendly helpful features like the retarded 'assisted braking' where under certain conditions the car craps its dacks and ups the sensitivity of the brake pedal, ending in you coming to a screeching halt the moment you try and heel+toe a gearshift. The primary rule that I drive by is that there's only one driver. I don't care if it's me, someone else, or the car itself, but if it's me, then no way in hell will I put up with the car trying to guess what I meant. Modern electronics can go f**k themselves until they get to the point that I really *can* put on the cruise control and hop in the back seat for a nap.