Carmakers Keep Data On Drivers' Locations From Navigation Systems

cold fjord writes "The Detroit News reports, 'A government report finds that major automakers are keeping information about where drivers have been — collected from onboard navigation systems — for varying lengths of time. Owners of those cars can't demand that the information be destroyed. And, says the U.S. senator requesting the investigation, that raises questions about driver privacy. The Government Accountability Office in a report released Monday found major automakers have differing policies about how much data they collect and how long they keep it. Automakers collect location data in order to provide drivers with real-time traffic information, to help find the nearest gas station or restaurant, and to provide emergency roadside assistance and stolen vehicle tracking. But, the report found, "If companies retained data, they did not allow consumers to request that their data be deleted, which is a recommended practice."'"

Comments

All across America

[istartedi]

All across America, well polished and maintained '57 Chevy convertibles just got that much cooler.

Re:All across America

[Anonymous Coward]

In today's weather, though, not one would start.

Re:All across America

[djmurdoch]

The summary (and the report it quotes) is inaccurate. Car owners *can* demand that the companies destroy the data.

The only problem is, the companies will just ignore the demand.

Re:All across America

[gstoddart]

A better question, why isn't the data automatically destroyed?

Because it's valuable to them. Because they'd love to have your car recommend a nearby restaurant. Because they can.

Welcome to a world ruled by Terms of Service and End User Licenses, and where corporate greed isn't regulated by privacy laws.

Re:All across America

[gstoddart]

Frankly, so what if someone know where you drove to last year.

Until your wife demands it for divorce proceedings which prove you were at your mistress when you should have been at work.

Or until someone decides that the fact that you were in Little Italy means you might be associated with organized crime.

Or any number of ways in which you don't expect your location to be constantly broadcast to a 3rd party, and be something which comes back to bite you in the ass.

Frankly, I would like the automotive companies to keep it forever but have to get my permission to give it to the government and that the government must serve ME with a warrant to get the data.

You are aware of the Patriot Act, right? The one which says they can walk into a company, demand your data, and it would be illegal for them to tell you about it?

Sorry, but as long as they can use national security laws to get this data, putting it into the hands of companies is no solution.

Sadly, people have known OnStar would have this capability for years.

Re:All across America

[Mashiki]

Uh what? The whole point behind a block heater is to reduce the initial startup cost for the car/truck. They guzzle heavily when under -6C(20f) until the intake manifold warms up, to lower the amount of time required to heat the cabin of the vehicle. And prevent damage to the engine itself, since the vast majority of vehicles don't pump oil before starting, increasing viscosity even a small amount reduces wear.

And the above has been known for decades. As a fun point, having too rich a mixture of antifreeze will corrode the aluminum, and eat the gaskets between various manifolds. Having it too weak, will lead to popped frost plugs(if you're lucky), and if you're unlucky broken heads, cracked blocks, or broken manifolds. I'll toss in one other thing, back when I was an apprentice in the 90's, a car came in that "wouldn't start" so said the customer. The antifreeze mixture had frozen(too old), and separated the intake manifold from the head. It had stripped all the bolts, warped the head, and broke the manifold. It was just shy of $4200 in repairs.

Re:All across America

[PopeRatzo]

When you look at large dataset over time people have never really looked at before, patterns emerge.

And the pattern for societies where people give away their liberty for safety or convenience shows that things often go very badly for those people.

But of course

[Black Parrot]

Our economy is increasingly based on collecting, trading, and exploiting customer information, rather than actually making and selling a product.

When's the bubble going to burst?

Re:A recommended practice?

[SirGarlon]

Because the last thing the Federal government cares about is the privacy of its citizens.

Now it is getting easier.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

I am a simple cheapskate and could not bear to part with 2000$ for a car-nav system that will be woefully out of date in 2 years and the car maker would be demanding 900$ for a map update, and the user interface might have been usable at some point in the design before the bean counters and marketers muscled in looking for brand differentiation and cool and oomph factor. So I have a cheap Garmin with a suction cup holder next to shifter.

Most people look at it and ask my why or at least raise an eye brow. Now I can simply say, "NSA". And they will nod understandingly and my mojo as the rebel who defies the draconian government will go up one notch.

They're not the only ones

[rlwhite]

I was in a meeting today with a state DOT official who showed how his department buys monthly GPS tracking data on all traffic in the state, combined from companies including TomTom, Garmin, AT&T, etc. by a private company and processed by the University of Maryland. He was able to use it to prioritize road improvements and later show the benefits of those improvements. The data he had (average speeds for small stretches of road at hourly intervals) was quite granular and powerful for what he was doing but innocuous from a privacy perspective. The question should be, who else are these companies selling the data to and in what form?

Yes, it has already happened

[DigitAl56K]

So far, this hasn't seemed to have happened, but if it does become public, there will be a backlash, especially OnStar which has the ability to track and disable cars in realtime [1].

Ahem. Just a few links that spring to mind. You can easily find others.

TomTom sorry for selling driver data to police

“Government Motors” To Track Drivers With OnStar, Sell Data to Police

OnStar Tracks Your Car Even When You Cancel Service

Busted! Your car's black box is spying, may be used against you in court

Re:A recommended practice?

[gstoddart]

Because the last thing the Federal government cares about is the privacy of its citizens.

Of course they don't. Because they can demand this information from them and use it themselves.

"Well, we couldn't get a warrant to install a GPS tracker, but since your Escalade had a GPS/OnStar, we'll just ask GM for all of your travel history. Gee, it says here you were in an area which is known to have drug dealers and prostitutes".

Much like the Patriot Act rendered cloud-computing to be a security problem for anybody not in the US but using a US based service, the internet of things will essentially cause all of your information to become the property of a company, and readily accessible to the US government.

I can't possibly put enough layers of tin-foil on to make me feel any better about this stuff. Because we're hurtling towards the dystopian future some of us have been fearing for years.

Only we seem to be voluntarily providing the companies with this stuff in return for shiny baubles.