UPDATE 2024: I caught some flack for this post back when I wrote it. Had someone write me to tell me I didn’t understand how cellular data technology worked. Now we find that auto manufacturers weren’t only doing this for themselves, they’ve monetized this data and are selling it to other companies. https://yro.slashdot.org/story/24/03/16/0410210/florida-man-sues-gm-and-lexisnexis-over-sale-of-his-cadillac-data
UPDATE: Looks like Ford is even admitting to the practice of spying on customers.
Last week my wife’s Honda Civic had its maintenance light come on letting us know it was due for an oil change.
Today we received a letter from Honda informing us the maintenance light was on, and urging us to schedule maintenance if we had not already done so.
How the frak did they know? Does the Honda Civic ‘phone home’ and report status periodically to Honda? If it does, how is that information being used, stored, and more importantly protected? It chills me to the bone to think that my car is ‘phoning home’ an unknown quantity of information about our driving habits. Might be time to trade it in for a less modern vehicle.
-Chris
Comments are closed.