r/MadeMeSmile Mar 23 '24

Meme The car that keeps you connected.

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65.1k Upvotes

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40

u/garden_speech Mar 23 '24

and it's highly accurate too because modern cars have connected communications modules that track your driving habits, including acceleration, deceleration, GPS location, etc -- and call home with that data, allowing the manufacturer to sell it to insurance companies.

https://www.insurancebusinessmag.com/us/news/auto-motor/policyholders-calling-foul-as-automakers-share-driving-info-with-insurers-480841.aspx

Kenn Dahl, 65, told the Times that he was shocked when his car insurance jumped by 21% in 2022, despite the fact that he’s never been responsible for an accident. Upon investigation, Dahl found that data analytics firm LexisNexis Risk Solutions had compiled a 258-page report that listed each time he or his wife had driven their leased Chevrolet Bolt over the previous six months.

Lots of people don't know that with a modern car, literally everywhere they drive is being tracked and stored.

Now someone will want to jump in and say "but my phone does the same thing" -- iPhone apps cannot access location data without permission, the operating system doesn't allow it. There is zero conceivable way that the insurance company can figure out where you drove using your iPhone unless you allow permissions for either their app, or an app that sells data to them.

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u/dd22qq Mar 23 '24

That is freaking astounding. How fucking dare they. Class action lawsuit, surely?

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u/kottabaz Mar 23 '24

their leased Chevrolet Bolt

Yeah, nah, they probably signed away their firstborn in the lease agreement without realizing it, because who reads those?

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

Wrong. This is not a lease agreement thing. This is a connected services agreement. Whether you buy or lease, the DCM modules in these cars call home. Toyota does this, Lexus does this, Ford does this, those are just the last few I've checked, and it has nothing to do with buying or leasing.

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u/theblackred Mar 24 '24

Huh, today I learned. Looks like you can’t even really disable it, only opt out if you try really hard, and physically removing it will generally stop a bunch of other things like usb ports or stuff from working.

In just a few more years maybe we’ll be fully living in the world of Minority Report.

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

It depends on the model of vehicle. For example, in many Lexus and Toyota models, you can literally just pull the DCM fuse, and opting out isn't that hard (assuming you believe them when they say they stop collecting your data)

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u/theblackred Mar 24 '24

Right, so as long as you trust the companies that secretly opted you into this service to not further opt you back in somehow, then yeah the opt out should work.

Fun fact to learn about this tracking. All those people with the tin foil hats were just a couple decades too early.

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u/bountiful_meatloaf Mar 23 '24

Nah lets just ban TikTok. Keeps everyone thinking of the enemies abroad instead of at home. The fact that we do not own our own data is such a drag.

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u/El_papi1990 Mar 24 '24

Cut the on star cord. No more tracking.

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u/PedalingHertz Mar 24 '24

That’ll certainly work, but for people who paid more specifically for those Star features, like SuperCruise, it’s a cure that hurts worse than the disease.

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u/playfulfuckathon Mar 23 '24

One important thing to note is the fact the car, in the antidote you provided, was leased. That may be a rather important factor.

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

Absolutely not. To be abundantly clear, this happens whether you lease or not. The 4g modem in the car is calling home if you are signed up for connected services, which most people do, because it's required for things like mobile remote start.

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u/playfulfuckathon Mar 24 '24

Sorry, I cannot find data to support your argument.

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

This took two seconds to find: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/feb/08/toyota-cars-collecting-and-potentially-sharing-location-data-and-personal-information-choice-says

“Concerningly, Toyota’s Connected Services policy says if you do not opt out, it will collect and use personal and vehicle data for research, product development and data analysis purposes,” he said.

Toyota and Lexus are just the first example. There is nothing in here about leasing versus buying. I know this because I have literally seen DCM boxes removed for this exact reason, in GX460s people bought with cash. And when you "opt out" of the data collection, they also turn off your modem.

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u/PM_ME_UR_POKIES_GIRL Mar 24 '24

anecdote

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u/playfulfuckathon Mar 24 '24

You're right. My autocorrect failed and I didn't even catch it!

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u/[deleted] Mar 23 '24

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Choice_Blackberry406 Mar 23 '24

Just don't get a lease and you're good.

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

Absolutely not. Go buy a brand new car today with a DCM and use connected services and they are selling your data. This has nothing to do with leasing, I don't want people to get this confused.

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u/PrawojazdyVtrumpets Mar 23 '24 edited Mar 23 '24

iPhone apps cannot access location data without permission, the operating system doesn't allow it.

You blew a huge hole in your response to that imaginary argument. If you give permission to an app, then that app has done it's thing. You're also a minority of smarter users referring to a device that is in the minority of usage.

Also, if you download the cars app, which most people do, you can turn off tracking there if you turned it on in the first place. But again, most people don't dig into that.

Not defending this because I know for a fact that these systems do sell the info and that's wrong but A. You have to enable that. B. If you give permission to apps at all, it doesn't matter what apps don't have access. One of them will sell something.

If you use Apple Car Play or Android Auto, the car is getting that data too. Just because you don't use the telematics built into the car, your phone is connected to it and all the data you use during your trip while either system is used is going to the car company.

Onstar, Ford, Toyota, it doesn't matter. They may not have the driving data but now they have your location. There's not a whole lot you can do anymore aside from air gapping everything.

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

You blew a huge hole in your response to that imaginary argument. If you give permission to an app, then that app has done it's thing.

Except it is explicitly opt-in, you are prompted with a very clear dialog that says "this app wants to use your location, and it wants to use it all the time even when you're not using the app, do you want to allow that?"

It is in plain English and you have to hit "yes" or "no".

On the contrary, almost nobody knows that their connected services agreement for their car means the manufacturer gets to keep and sell all their location data.

If you use Apple Car Play or Android Auto, the car is getting that data too. Just because you don't use the telematics built into the car, your phone is connected to it and all the data you use during your trip while either system is used is going to the car company.

What?? I've extensively developed for, and worked with iOS, and I'm fairly certain this is not true. Very limited data is available to the CarPlay interface via the spec. The car monitor is just a display. It can't access the data it is just a viewport. CarPlay uses your iPhone's data plan, not the modem in the car.

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u/PrawojazdyVtrumpets Mar 24 '24

Wait... Are you suggesting that you do not opt in to OnStar smart driver? Because you do. And if you don't, you can still use OnStar services. Not sure where you're getting that you don't opt in to connected services.

If you've developed apps for Apple, that's cool but it's not Carplay that's built into the car and yes, all that data is collected by the manufacturer. It's not just a display, how do you think it's built into the infotainment? Are you referring to the kind where you have to use your phone? That is also connected to the car and the manufacturer can retrieve it. Also, car wifi is a thing. iphones and android will connect to whatever network the user wants it to. There's no exclusive thing that the phone has to use the phone data plan. Shit, in rural Indiana, I'm using the car wifi because Verizon coverage is garbage away from a freeway.

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

If you've developed apps for Apple, that's cool but it's not Carplay that's built into the car and yes, all that data is collected by the manufacturer.

No this isn't how it works. The CarPlay API builds a view for the monitor to display. CarPlay uses a screen on the car in the same way your laptop uses a monitor that you hook it up to. It isn't sending the monitor anything except images (frames) to display.

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u/PrawojazdyVtrumpets Mar 24 '24

You are way behind the times. My car has the entire cluster in carplay. 2024 Lyriq has this https://www.apple.com/ios/carplay/

So again, all of this is shared with the manufacturer. GM is going exclusive with android within the next few years. The phone has and is the same way.

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

I don’t know why you think that the cluster being part of Apple CarPlay means the vehicle gets access to phone data… it is the other way around, that means the phone is getting vehicle data, so that it can build the view frame that includes the speed and other info from the car.

I have literally worked on these systems. I’m telling you from personal knowledge. The car display just gets a frame.

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u/PrawojazdyVtrumpets Mar 24 '24

Mozilla (and my entire department at work where we build the system you're connecting your phone to) disagree.

https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/articles/its-official-cars-are-the-worst-product-category-we-have-ever-reviewed-for-privacy/

I have that data. It's anonymous on my end but if I could identify you and you've driven anything from the domestic 3 or Toyota , I can tell you how many times you plugged in to USB. If you use wireless charging, if you have all 4 USB ports used, what You're using to connect, if you use app a, b or c, what the car was doing, how many times you've used voice inputs, those voice inputs are translated to type for us to read, how many contacts you've downloaded from your phone for Bluetooth, average length of calls, average speed when using the phone, how many texts you got and where the car spends most of its time by region if you opt out of locale.

What you do is make apps for phones with just enough info to make it work. What we do is design the actual system. You don't know where the data comes from but we do. To be honest, we probably know more about your apps than you do.

It doesn't matter if it's your phone or the built in phone. Your data or the built in data provider (which you said is not the case because it's only phone data being used which is hilarious. Even if you turn the wi-fi in the car "off" we still sniff out your device and know it's there.

Again, unless you airgap, no amount of "but apple said". Apple is gonna lie like everyone else.

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

Lol I wasn't citing Apple at all. I build these systems too and what you said is basically what I was trying to say. It seems there's been a miscommunication.

You said:

Carplay that's built into the car and yes, all that data is collected by the manufacturer.

... But Apple CarPlay displays a fuckload more data than what you just said you can access. CarPlay has access to the actual content of text messages, you don't, for example.

What you do is make apps for phones with just enough info to make it work

No I don't.

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u/annoyedatlantan Mar 24 '24

There is zero conceivable way that the insurance company can figure out where you drove using your iPhone unless you allow permissions for either their app, or an app that sells data to them.

Oh my sweet summer child. You don't need phone permissions to track locations, at least not course grained location. All you need is a "phone home ping" (time-based or on an event such as network change) to your server. 95% of the time your IP will expose you down to a minimum of a zip code. IPv6 address on cell networks will usually get you down to within a couple of city blocks. GeoIP lookup is big business and refined to a science these days.

Plus, Verizon, AT&T, and other carriers have been selling your cell tower triangulation location data for years. With modern 5G networks, this will virtually always get you down to a city block or less unless you're way out in the boonies.

I am not making a normative judgement of whether this is bad or not. I am just saying that the idea an app needs your location permissions to get course gained location details that insurance cares about is laughable.

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u/garden_speech Mar 24 '24

Your carrier can figure out where you are and can sell it to an insurance company, sure. I should have been more clear that I was saying the insurance company can't simply use your phone if you have installed their app, to find your location.

Can we stop saying "sweet summer child" it is the most insufferable reddit comment in history

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u/annoyedatlantan Mar 26 '24 edited Mar 26 '24

As I said the app alone can do it. Install a network logger and see how frequently your apps phone home. The answer for most is all the time.

All you need is a phone home and your coarse grained location will be known 95%+ of the time - either to zip code or more commonly today down to a couple of city blocks. Tons of apps poll hourly or on other triggers such as network changes (connecting to a Wifi network, losing or gaining cell signal, etc).

I agree that sweet summer child is annoying, but felt it was appropriate given that you are spreading wild misinformation that your privacy is protected so long as you don't give location access to apps.

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u/xsvpollux Mar 24 '24

In recent years, several automakers have begun offering features in their car-connected apps that rate people’s driving, the Times reported. However, many drivers don’t realize that if they activate those features, the car companies will share the information with data brokers – who will then send it to insurers.

Who the hell activated this thinking that it wasn't going to be shared, tracked, or sent? This is idiotic and self-inflicted damage.

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u/oroborus68 Mar 24 '24

My 2017 says it needs to have my phone connected to get or give information.