- cross-posted to:
- privacy@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- privacy@lemmy.world
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That one is easy: do not get a new Honda.
Don’t buy a new car, there, FTFY.
Call me an asshole but I think giving driving habit information to insurers is great, so long as good habits are given discounts and bad habits are punished.
I’m one of those people who would love automatic enforcement of driving laws as well as user reportable incidents of other drivers (given you can provide footage of something you’re reporting.)
If people don’t like living under the law… maybe the law shouldn’t exist. “That’s the way it is” is a terrible excuse for fucking anything.
Oh, and make audit trails for this shit public record. Someone creating AI videos or fake reports? Punish that too. It’ll never happen though. People want laws for others, not themselves.
Yeah let’s encourage citizens to report their neighbors for every legal offense, this kind of thing has always gone well throughout history
Say, I’m pretty sure I saw you invite a couple folks into your home the other day, and I never saw them come out. Oh would you look at that, the SS is here!
Similarities to fascism aside, this is still an awful idea. Have you ever dealt with automated rule enforcement? It’s an awful way to enforce rules. But even if every single report had a human follow up on it, there’s also massive, unprecedented privacy issues. You may be totally fine with my insurance company knowing where I am 24/7, but I sure as hell am not. I’m super not okay with a government (which we have) gaining free access to that information for anything they want (which they would). Oh hey, we’re back to fascism
Fucking hell, you’re actually promoting a surveillance dystopia.
You’re fucked.
Without absolute transparency and total accountability it’s going to be abused, but we already live in a surveillance dystopia. Have you ever seen what happens to whistle blowers today?
Your an asshole. I’d highly recommend looking into this topic, you might be a victim of it aswell.
If you have ever driven on the road, you would know that not everyone drives perfectly, and do not drive as other drivers expect them too, and shit just happens that we cannot control.
While we all share the same road, we do not share the same page. That leads to people needing to hard brake/accelerate quickly/ect,ect,ect. Or other things happen that requires a driver to stop/accelerate/serve. Where I live we have a lot of deer and moose, and they cause alot, and I mean ALOT of accidents.
Or if you have ever driven in a modern car, most of them will tell you the local speed limit, but sometimes what the car says is the speed limit, and what the legal limit actually is are different, so say your in a 70 zone, but the car thinks it’s a 50 zone, the car think your speeding, when your actually not.
So anyways, what insurance companies are doing, are using the cars data and increasing insurance rates for people who have had hard breaks or “speeding” and other things that would make then a “risk”. Insurance companies have no fucking clue why the car did what it did, but for them it’s a reason to increase rates, when what probably happened was the driver prevented an accident from taking place.
no thanks. i hate the entire concept of insurance (especially lawfully forced insurance). there’s no way i want them spying on me.
there are parts of the west where there’s not another car for miles. why should i be punished for minor infractions on a lonely country road when i put no one but myself at risk? this is the same as getting ticketed by a camera for running a red light in the middle of nowhere.
if the law and technology becomes a tool of oppression, it no longer serves a useful purpose for mankind.
Basic traffic liability insurance sorta makes sense - it’d suck you had your car wrecked by someone broke and were SOL.
i think that if i am going to be forced to purchase a product from the market, then the government should just provide the product. add the damages to my tax bill if i get in an accident that’s my fault.
but don’t make me buy shit just to function in society.
it’s a scam. the money you pay in is always more than they pay out. it’s a for profit industry that i’m forced to fund. it’s a racket, no different from organized crime.
who picks what habits are good and what are bad? who decides what happens to data beyond this? can you going to mcdonalds twice a day be shared with your health insurer? can you going to that rally be shared with the local police? with your landlord? are you comfortable with everyone knowing everything? because there’s two things you do with data: analyze, and sell.
can you going to mcdonalds twice a day be shared with your health insurer?
You think this data isn’t already shared?
you think that I’m in favor of everything I’m not currently talking about?
I don’t think I’m going to ever buy a car made after 2020. Maybe earlier. None of the new features really appeal to me, and there are a lot of things like this that actively turn me off from wanting a new car.
If they could just give me an electric version of a 1985 VW Golf I’d be happy as a clam. But they want to put me in some lumpy, heavy, clumsy CUV with tracking technology and all the touchscreens and I don’t like it.
EV conversions are definitely a thing. And the Golf platform seems to actually be one of the most popular.
After a quick Google, it looks like there are even some premade kits for the Golf specifically, even with installation available. Although I can only find UK/EU links quickly. May be more built-it yourself in the US.
Crap like this is why I ride a motorcycle.
Only one of my bikes even manages to have enough electronics in it to have a clock.
They will figure out a way to bundle it
You can rip out the cell connection
Not always.
Sometimes it’s so integrated into the other systems there’s no separate component to “rip out”.
You may be able to pull the antenna cable and put a dummy on it (like used for testing radios). It’ll absorb all the RF from the transmitter.
What if it has a redundant connection? At the end of the day you do not own the car
Weird, I guess this title I registered at the dmv isn’t real.
I’m sure it only has one. And I’m not sure you know how ownership works. It’s privacy I’m more concerned about.
My point is people shouldn’t need to try to outsmart the car manufacturer for basic privacy rights. If you don’t fully control something you don’t own something.
Imagine if they remotely bricked a bunch of vehicles. (Ransomware maybe?) You would be powerless to stop them and out of luck. I’m sure there would be a lawsuit but you still would be without a car.
Disconnecting the antenna is probably not a bad idea but the problem is cars have become black box computers so you never know where there could be a weakness. For all you know it might be possible to crash the car systems via Bluetooth.
What I want is some user freedom laws plus some DMCA exceptions for consumers looking to escape vendor lock in. Privacy protections would also be nice but being able to change and examine software would be a step in the right direction.
I feel like not buying a Honda would be a pretty good way to opt out. In fact since the majority of car manufacturers are doing this bullshit I feel like simply not purchasing a new car is a great way to opt out of this.
Plenty of older not smart cars that are perfectly usable or fairly easily restored no reason to go dropping the money on a brand new one that’s not only a privacy disaster but a repairability disaster on top of it.
I think my favorite is how almost all new cars now come with a sealed transmission with absolutely no way to replace the fluid in it with the claims of it being a “lifetime fluid” there is no such thing as a transmission fluid that can last and do its job forever, what they mean by LifeTime fluid is that it will last long enough to satisfy the warranty. And what they have deemed should be the usable life of the car.
Shit I hadn’t heard about that sealed transmission thing, that’s fucked up. Transmission fluid replacement seemed pretty important on the maintenance schedule of all the cars I’ve had
I believe Honda started this in the early 2000s because they found that transmissions were compromised at earlier mileages at a much more frequent rate from leaks, bad fluid changes, or missing the intervals, than were actually failing from use. So they designed the cars for how they were actually being used and maintained. It’s kind of a non-issue unless you’ve got 300k+ miles on your transmission, at which point you’d expect to potentially replace it anyway.
It’s been happening for a long time, even some cars is far back as 2012 have a supposed lifetime fluid. Although they at least still have the drain bolt so that you can say yeah that’s cute and do it anyway. But lately the drain bolt has gone away and they are completely sealed meaning you can’t change it even if you want to
Just today I said goodbye to my 2012 chrysler minivan because of the “lifetime sealed transmission.” Now Chrysler minivan transaxles have always been garbage, this is known. But mine said in the owner’s manual, “lifetime, sealed transaxle” “no fluid fills or dipstick.” I worked at a Chrysler shop and asked the service manager - “nope, don’t need to do nothin’.” OK, all good.
Yeaahhh… That’s not entirely true. 160k on the odo and it lost the desire to ‘go’ in drive (no forward progress in drive despite the little engine trying it’s best), a hell of a scream coming from the engine bay and a light show of errors on the dash. Limped it home and the code reader said that gears 1 & 3 had a “ratio mismatch” which should only happen if they lost teeth, and a couple others I don’t remember. Figured it was scrap. Had a mechanic friend look at it; he popped off a tube, fingered it a bit, sniffed it and said to try changing out the filter and as much fluid as I could. Did that, dropped about 5qt in (with no goddamned dipstick, how do you tell how much it needs?) and the thing ran great for another 3 months. Until today when it started making the whining noise again. Dropped it off and said goodbye.
Fuck “sealed” transmissions. Sorry, I had to rant. I loved that van - no tracking, had a Sirius radio that has 50 song and 50 artist alerts and 300gb on board mp3 storage, and the 2 screen DVD system (great for parents that don’t want their kids on tablets but still want to occupy them on long trips)
Cars are just catching up to HVAC systems… In the last 3 years I’ve had to replace both inside and outside fan motors because their (maintenance free) bearings failed.
I’m missing something. How is the data actually collected? How does it get out of my car? My car doesn’t have any cellular features other than CarPlay. It has wifi, but I’ve never used it.
Cellular is usually how the vehicle provides Wi-Fi, it is effectively just a cell hotspot like you would get from a ohone carrier, but tied into the vehicle. So I think that would be the common way they get the data out.
Potentially when you put it in for a service, could also be using bluetooth
People take their cars to dealership garages? Fuck that noise lmao
I hear you, but wiith new cars its often a condition of the warranty to use official dealers
It seems a lot of the new ones have a cellular modem. On the surface it’s to let you remotely access the car or do a remote start. Even if you don’t pay to subscribe and use it for your purposes they can utilize it to transfer out the data.
The size of the title on that article is insane on a monitor.
Anyway.
Companies are quick to flaunt their privacy policies, but those amount to pages upon pages of legalese that leave even professionals stumped about what exactly car companies collect and where that information might go.
Does anyone remember that report about the university researchers who studied one of these smart thermostats and concluded that you would have to sign more than a thousand legal disclaimers to properly consent to have it in your home?
Are any of you even able to afford new cars? Who the hell’s buying this shit? I probably won’t have a new car ever.
Total new vehicle sales has remained roughly static for a little less than two decades. So yes, people can afford new cars.
For most, they can afford to finance them, but the rates aren’t looking too good lately
https://www.statista.com/statistics/290673/auto-loan-rates-usa/
Well yeah, they follow the prime rate.
Yeah rates alone have made financing a new car pretty stupid. Save as much cash as possible and spend within your means
Yes
Buying a new car never really made sense to me even when you could afford it. 2 - 3 year old model is effectively brand new but a lot cheaper. Why pay more if you can pay less?
Mostly social signalling
Fuck social signaling.
2 - 3 year old model is effectively brand new but a lot cheaper.
I’ve always heard this, but where is this actually true? When I bought a Camry like a decade ago, I could get a brand new one for $19.5k or used ones with 50k miles on them for…$18k. so yeah I paid the extra 1.5k to not have to deal with potential random shit.
When my wife bought her car a few years ago it was a similar situation. The only used cars that were “a lot cheaper” had like 100k miles.
People who have a college education and well paying jobs.
I have a college education and a well paying job the monthly payment on a new car has doubled since I bought my last one in 2020. No way am I buying a new car at these prices/rates.
Fair enough
With my last raise I’m over 130k a year and I still don’t buy new cars. My 2010 Audi is still running just fine.
That’s great, but the question from that OP was “are you able to” and your answer should be yes. I make less than that and I definitely am able to. But I’m waiting on the market to correct first
Though it also depends on how you define “able to”. Like I could fit a car payment in my budget but it would eat up most of my disposable income and I’m not willing to give that up, even if new cars weren’t so enshitified. I bet there’s a lot in this “technically capable but it would be a stupid financial move” group.
back in my day Spock had small hair
✅ well paying job
✅ Dropped out of college and went full time
Also mind that soon these new cars will be used cars with the same bullshit.
It made sense to me when I could take advantage of a tax credit for EVs in 2017. Now that car companies/dealerships simply jack up prices to eat that discount, it doesn’t make sense even in that case.
People are buying new cars. I’m guessing it’s mostly leasing.
For those who haven’t yet bought a Honda:
- you have the option to buy from alternative brands to say fuck you using your wallet
They’re basically all doing it, so make sure to research who is doing it the least.
Or at this point, the one whose tracking is easiest and safest to avoid or circumvent.
How easy is the telematics unit to remove and whether disabling it affects the functions that are important to you.
The only car makers that give data deletion options are Dacia Renault:
Only two - Renault and Dacia, which are not sold in North America - offer drivers the option to have their data deleted
Good news! Has the time finally come for us to buy a Dacia Sandero?
10-15k for a new car where do I sign up?
Pulling the fuse that includes OnStar at least keeps it from calling home. But there’s usually some collateral damage.
What kind of damage?
Personally I’d call that a safety issue. A few years ago my wife and I were driving a rental car that was rear ended on the highway by a drunk driver. The impact caved in the left rear wheel and spun us 360 degrees across 3 lanes of the highway. Within a few seconds of coming to a stop an OnStar person was talking to us, asking if we were ok and confirming our location.
We had no clue ahead of time that the rental car had one of these services, but at that moment we were very happy it did. I honestly have no idea about the privacy ramifications, etc. but having been through that experience I’d think long and hard about disabling it outright. I do take my privacy seriously, but I’d have to weigh that against the safety of me & my family in that kind of situation and disable it only as an absolutely last resort… Just my own personal $0.02 on the matter.
With how everybody and their mother have smartphones in their pockets, I wouldn’t be too worried.
Depending on the crash you could be unable to reach for the phone.
Don’t make life choices based on outliers
No! I mean everybody else! Someone else is going to call for help.
That depends a lot on where you drive. I’ve been in situations where, if I had hit a moose, there would have been no one around to call for help except the moose (assuming it had survived the collision, but they often do if it’s a smaller vehicle). That stretch of road didn’t get many passers-by on snowy Sunday nights in January. Maybe a half-dozen vehicles an hour. Combine that with poor visibility, and it could have been a long time before someone noticed and called for help. Fortunately, I never did have an accident along that stretch.
Of course, if you’re only driving in built-up areas or along major transit corridors instead of in awkward parts of northern Ontario in the middle of winter, your chances of having someone call in for you are much higher.
Does OnStar even work in far out regions like this? Is there even any cell reception? If not then that point is pretty irrelevant.
And if it’s so far out, would emergency services even arrive in time to save you anyways?
OnStar never knows where you are. It only knows where YOUR CAR is.
Think about it and decide whether your car’s privacy is worth the cost.
Oh, true. Luckily I never go anywhere in my car so none of my positional data will correlate with the car’s.
A hammer is great for hammering nails… and heads.
Humans, eh?
I think my car only came with a free trial for that service, I think you needed to pay after a certain amount of time. Cell phone works well enough for me.
Playing devil’s advocate, in a crazy accident you may not be able to get to/reach your phone, or even be responsive. If you use the personal assistant function on your phone, it’s no different than using OnStar, in terms of privacy.
All of this said, last I heard OnStar was pretty expensive for the average household income. I don’t have it, and I don’t worry too much about it.
You assume you’ll have the ability to reach and use your phone
You’re not alone on the road.
It’s incredibly unlikely that you’d be in such a bad accident that you couldn’t call for help; while simultaneously being isolated from the public to the point nobody saw your accident and started calling ems/police before you could.
That’s not to say it doesn’t happen; but I definitely wouldn’t be worried about it.
You obviously don’t live or drive in a semi-rural area at night with larger wildlife that tends to dart across the road in front of cars. All it takes is hitting a deer or javelina hard and going into a ditch.
I’m not saying you should live your life in fear of that. But it is not too difficult to imagine these kinds of scenarios. It happened to me once lol
Also, some of the places I drive? Yeah, I am definitely alone on the road for very long periods of time.
I estimate that the probability of injuring my arms and that no one else is around to call for help is low enough to not be worth the monthly subscription.
Low probability, high salience. Know the difference.
I judge based on probability and severity, and the probability is small enough even though the severity is high for me to not be concerned.
I’m not saying it’s worth the monthly subscription, but it is not too hard to imagine the scenario where you get in a car wreck and you get knocked out
My car microphone stopped working
The newer model CR-V doesn’t need an app, it’s just a toggle in the car settings. That icon at the top like the article shows is definitely annoying and I agree in calling it a dark pattern.
c/fuckcars
Yeah. Fuck cars.
Solution: If it’s spy on you then don’t buy it.
Next problem.
There isn’t much of an alternative. All major manufacturers have been doing this for a while, we are approaching the point where you’ll need to buy and maintain a classic car to avoid this type of data collection. Unfortunately, most people simply do not have the time, money, and expertise to do that. Nor should they have to.
Counterpoint: sometimes it’s difficult to tell if something is surveilling you, especially for laypersons.
The hero photo for the article shows a camera over a road that likely is likely running number plate recognition software…
Honestly I’d be more worried about where that data is going than the tracking software in your car. They’ve got the most critical information (where did you drive and when), and they’ve got it for every car instead of just Honda drivers.
This needs to be fixed with legislation, and it needs to be fixed actively. For example by getting rid of number plates entirely and replacing them with something like the transponders used in aircrafts and ships, but with an encrypted rolling code that only shares your data with authorised parties.
It could work like the “Find My” feature on an iPhone, where your location is encrypted and uploaded to the servers anonymously… the decryption key is only provided when the actual owner of the device authorises a data lookup. E.g. in a traffic stop, police could ask you to tap a button on your car that sends the cops your insurance/etc.
