this post was submitted on 07 May 2024

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614

How to opt out of the privacy nightmare that comes with new Hondas (sherwood.news)

submitted 6 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago

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?

[+] [email protected] -21 points 6 months ago (5 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Fucking hell, you're actually promoting a surveillance dystopia.

You're fucked.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

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?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

Yes.. And your advocating for more power to the people killing and jailing whistleblowers?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

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

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

I’m super not okay with a government (which we have) gaining free access to that information for anything they want (which they would)

I fully believe they already have it.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 months ago (1 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Basic traffic liability insurance sorta makes sense - it'd suck you had your car wrecked by someone broke and were SOL.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

it’d suck you had your car wrecked by someone broke and were SOL

Welcome to New Hampshire, land of 0 auto insurance.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago (1 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

Our government will forcibly insure you if you don't have one, so technically you don't have to buy anything. It's just more expensive than anything on the market.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 months ago (2 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

can you going to mcdonalds twice a day be shared with your health insurer?

You think this data isn't already shared?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

you think that I'm in favor of everything I'm not currently talking about?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Honestly it doesn't really matter what you or I are really in favor of when it comes to privacy and surveillance. Today we're already tracked everywhere. Data privacy is a nice idea and even with all the laws in the world there is no transparency to make sure companies follow them. Our car tracking us is annoying and all but we all carry these things called cell phones which have GPS in them and we keep them on all the time. How many people have apps like facebook installed which harvest all kinds of data and then sell it to whoever is willing to pay? Speeding is already going to be seen with just that data. Even if you turn all the tracking off on your phone the fucking cell company knows where you're connecting from and that data goes right into a little database in a three letter agency.

The US Government today can legally get whatever data they want from anywhere in the US and most of europe. Maybe not your local cop, but someone, somewhere, taking orders from the US government in the name of something like terrorism has access to everything. Corruption is everywhere and everything can and will be abused. Opaque systems like we have today only proliferates corruption.

Technological solutions can absolutely be developed that are transparent and don't give exceptions to cops driving personal vehicles. We absolutely can develop systems where senators, representatives and even billionaires are not above the law, but today in practice they essentially are.

But hey, like I said. My opinion doesn't matter. Yours doesn't either. We don't get any say in how this stuff works. The idea that enforcement of our laws might be applied consistently across the board is terrifying to people because we all do illegal shit all day long in our own little personal corrupt universe. We just want to believe the cops will stop "the other guy" more than us and that we'll be able to be smarter than the system. It's fucked and nothing will change. The owners of the US just want the cops there so they can punish the ones who act out in the order of things in a way that might hurt them or their friends and family, and that's how it's gonna work.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

I mean they use the data to decide what actions are high risk. Someone tailgating and tapping their brakes constantly is inherently less safe than someone leaving proper distance.

Privacy theft, I get it. An opt out should always be available and easy to use.

If you truly have an issue with insurance deciding what is or isn't safe there are organizations that can take over that such as ASTM or NFPA.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Please, Toyota, don't do this. They refuse to go full out EV. Hopefully they too decide to keep some of these technologies away from their products.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 6 months ago (2 children)

I really don't understand why going EV seems to be synonymous with "collect all the data." The only differences should be in the drivetrain, and they don't need to collect any data to switch that to an electric motor from an ICE or Hydrid drive system.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I suspect that it's because they are marketed to be as much of a tech gadget as transportation. An iPad on wheels. So they figure that they can slip in this crap.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago

Yeah, and I really don't want that crap. I just want something to get me from A to B that I can fill up at home. Give me something cheap and reliable and I'll buy it.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago (1 children)

It's already happening anyways on non ev cars and has been for years. They all have monitors and tech in there.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

The sad part is that manual transmissions are going away, which means I'm completely SOL if the electronics die. But I guess on the flipside, there's no transmission to break, so that's nice.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Give and takes. I'm waiting another 10 years till I hop on the electric vehicle camp. Just want some more competition and reliability.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

I think competition is pretty good right now, the main issue is range. Toyota is claiming to have much longer range battery tech in like 3 years (they've promised before), so if that materializes, we could see really compelling EVs in like 5 years.

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