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Phone App That Watches Your Driving Habits Leads To Privacy Concerns

Posted by samzenpus on from the buying-your-privacy dept.

Toshito writes Desjardins Insurance has launched a smartphone app that tracks driver behaviour in return for the promise of substantial savings on car insurance. Two years ago, Desjardins began offering a telematic device that plugs into a vehicle's diagnostic port, to track acceleration, hard braking and the time of day you were driving, for instance. Now, there's no plug-in device required. With Desjardins's new Ajusto app, all you need is your smartphone. But this comes with great concerns over privacy, and problems have been reported where the device was logging data when the user was riding a bus instead of driving his own car.

5 of 73 comments (clear)

  1. Gosh, really? It's a privacy concern? by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 4, Insightful

    No kidding. It's tracking you constantly when you're in your car, and in some cases, even when you're not. You've sold your personal data (your current location) for a tiny bit of lucre. Why people might think this ISN'T a walking, talking privacy breach of the first order is beyond me.

    --
    Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
  2. How does this work? by BitterOak · · Score: 3, Interesting

    What if you just have your phone turned off when you drive, or don't take it with you in the first place? Maybe the insurance savings are even substantial enough that you can get a second phone and only take the phone with this app on short trips and drive on those trips very carefully. When you want to do your street racing, you bring the other phone.

    --
    If I can be modded down for being a troll, can I be modded up for being an orc, or a balrog?
    1. Re:How does this work? by R3d+M3rcury · · Score: 3, Funny

      What if you just have your phone turned off when you drive, or don't take it with you in the first place?

      I'd imagine there might be an issue if you filed a claim and they looked at the data and said, "Hey, you weren't even in the car!"

      "Of course I was! Look at this broken arm!"

      "Not according to our data."

      "Well, I turned off the phone..."

      "Ah! That's against the policy--the phone must be on if you're in the car. We don't have to pay a cent! Whoo hoo!"

  3. Isn't this standard? by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 3, Funny

    Isn't the 'app' development process to the point where you don't even consider shipping until you've built at least one egregious privacy issue into your product?

  4. Punished for other people's driving. by SeaFox · · Score: 3, Interesting

    But this comes with great concerns over privacy, and problems have been reported where the device was logging data when the user was riding a bus instead of driving his own car.

    So is there some additional device in the car the phone app pairs with? Otherwise, how does the app know when you're driving your own car or simply a passenger in someone else's. This whole thing doesn't sound like it was thought out very well.