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What kind of data is my new car collecting?

theglobeandmail.com

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Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#81

As long as self-driving a car will be allowed (and I predict this will become quickly impossible the moment self-driven cars will share the space with autonomous vehicles) I will refrain buying any car collecting AND transmitting data without my consent. Yes that means in ten years or so I will be riding a used shabby old car.

A used shabby car can be completely rebuilt, not just the engine, for a tenth of the cost of a new car.

Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a diesel car that I once drove with no alternator and no battery: started off a jump and drove to the auto parts store. Radio, windows, and lights were dead, but the car drove fine.

Fond memories of my Merceded W124. You could rip the engine out of the car and it would go on and on. No electricity for motor management required whatsoever.

I think you meant "rip the battery out"?

Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#83
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Turn JS off by default and white-list websites that you trust.1

I have JS disabled, and this site says it can’t validate my access to the article.

I have JS on, and it works fine.

Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The information is still not even remotely accurate enough for this to work without ridiculously high levels of false positives. An obvious example would be in Germany. The autobahn for example has sections that are unrestricted, but those same sections are 130kmh (or sometimes lower) if it's between certain times or raining or whatever. Half of the time my car interprets that as just being 130. Outside of that; ther…

I guess that depends on country. For example the UK has no public road (that I'm aware of) where a speed of higher than 70mph is allowed, so that would be an easy initial rule. Where there are dynamic speed limits in place, it would be plausible to report back possibles (car location and speed) which could then be checked against a central database which was more accurate. I'm not suggesting that such a system is a g…

This already exists and it's a massive fucking joke - it's called "black box insurance unit". My sister had one in her car and during one year we've had to ring up the insurance company multiple times to manually correct her driving score, as she was being penalised for "severe speeding". After asking the company to send us the full tracking data it was completely obvious that the system doesn't have enough accuracy - couple times it tagged her as going 50mph(!!!) over the speed limit, because she was driving 70mph on the motorway going over a small 20mph road.....so the system naively queried the speed limit at coordinates XYZ and concluded that she was going nearly 4x the limit. Good thing her insurance wasn't automatically cancelled over it as I've heard it happen to many people in this country(and then you need to go and fight it with the insurance company, like your time is free or something).

Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#85
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> s tampering and the problem of car reselling doesn't apply as cars cannot be resold anymore without manufacturer involvement. I suspect this will become a huge societal problem if it continues like this in a car-dependent country like the US. Yes, the middle-class people will probably still be able to purchase $30,000-40,000 cars for the foreseeable future (even adjusted for inflation), but what will happen to the…

Good reliable cars are currently cheaper than ever. Of all the problems stacked against the poor, I'm not sure that cars have become less obtainable. Adjusted for inflation, the cheapest economy cars are quite inexpensive, and generally speaking, they last much longer than they did 20-30 years ago.

That's the opposite sentiment that I've heard recently (from an American perspective). My understanding is that our used cars are more expensive than ever due to:

a) Certified pre-owned and similar programs making some used cars more appealing (and thus more valuable), removing them from the supply of unvetted, cheap used cars.

b) More folks being able to afford used cars around the world. It seems like at the lower end of the market, many American used cars are shipped to Latin America or the Caribbean (in Europe many older cars are sent to Africa), again reducing the supply of used cars.

This is my sketchy recollection of things I've heard and read, I don't have any direct sources to link you to, but I've certainly heard multiple people bemoan that say, $5-10k doesn't buy you nearly as good a car as it used to (even adjusting for inflation).

EDIT: As an aside, the issue of shipping cars to different regions could also prove interesting for owners down the road. There are already some issues there - I believe my car's navigation system is for North America, or maybe US+Canada. So if my car gets shipped to Argentina in 10 years, the Nav will be useless or will need an update. Not a huge deal. But if Tesla's Autopilot is tuned for conditions and laws in a certain region, it would presumably require reprogramming for another region. Would that be an automatic over-the-air update? Or would Tesla not want to bother with free updates to a 20-year-old car?

Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#86

One thing that's interesting to me is, modern cars know (relatively accurately) whether you're speeding or not. They have GPS and a database of speed limits. Also depending on what's in the car, they may know who was driving it. How long before a speed safety campaign starts arguing that car manufacturers should be handing over information about people breaking the law in their cars to law enforcement...

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/27/cars-in-europe-could-be-fitt... You won't be allowed to break the law. The petrol heads will complain but they will lose because "think of the children".

Even the very proposals for this say that there should be an ovveride in the cabin, just like you can switch the Start/Stop system off. I'm one of those "petrolheads" and it's not a law I worry about in the slightest.

Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tv's are simple though, just don't connect them to a network and they work fine.

I've heard allegations that some of the newer TVs will automatically scan for open networks in the background.

They very well might scan even with no networks configured (some Wi-Fi stacks scan in the background by default; it can reduce the the time the user has to wait when selecting an SSID or initiating a connection), but has anyone claimed that they actually connect? I think that would make headlines.

Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The information is still not even remotely accurate enough for this to work without ridiculously high levels of false positives. An obvious example would be in Germany. The autobahn for example has sections that are unrestricted, but those same sections are 130kmh (or sometimes lower) if it's between certain times or raining or whatever. Half of the time my car interprets that as just being 130. Outside of that; ther…

I guess that depends on country. For example the UK has no public road (that I'm aware of) where a speed of higher than 70mph is allowed, so that would be an easy initial rule. Where there are dynamic speed limits in place, it would be plausible to report back possibles (car location and speed) which could then be checked against a central database which was more accurate. I'm not suggesting that such a system is a g…

I retain a small amount of hope that this could lead to more sensible motorway speed limits. Virtually everyone drives over 70mph on motorways.

If the law were strictly applied the cumulative offences would result in virtually all drivers of “smart” cars being instantly banned from driving

Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The information is still not even remotely accurate enough for this to work without ridiculously high levels of false positives. An obvious example would be in Germany. The autobahn for example has sections that are unrestricted, but those same sections are 130kmh (or sometimes lower) if it's between certain times or raining or whatever. Half of the time my car interprets that as just being 130. Outside of that; ther…

I guess that depends on country. For example the UK has no public road (that I'm aware of) where a speed of higher than 70mph is allowed, so that would be an easy initial rule. Where there are dynamic speed limits in place, it would be plausible to report back possibles (car location and speed) which could then be checked against a central database which was more accurate. I'm not suggesting that such a system is a g…

In the US this sort of detection is privatized - by insurance companies lowering your rates if you run their app which beans your location, speed, and motion/fitness data to their servers. At least for Allstate you need 50 drives a month to qualify for the discount, and hard braking or speeds over 80 disqualify a drive from being counted for the discount.

Re: What kind of data is my new car collecting?

#90

Not too long ago I owned a motorcycle from the 70s. I realized at one point that it was probably EMP-proof: no fuel injection, no fuel pump, certainly no OBD anything, and a (literal) kickstarter. The most complicated thing in the wiring harness was the key cylinder and the relay for the turn signals and headlights. I miss that bike sometimes.

I had a diesel car that I once drove with no alternator and no battery: started off a jump and drove to the auto parts store. Radio, windows, and lights were dead, but the car drove fine.

I still own a MB with OM616 [1] engine. It does not need an alternator when it runs. Even to turn fuel supply on/off it uses mechanical valve which is on the dashboard. It turns 40 this year but it starts in a split second even in cold winter.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_OM616_engine

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