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Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

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Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#221
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, people are just imagining the NSA led global surveillance apparatus.

Nah, the NSA doesn't need to bug your car. All cars after 2016 or so come pre bugged with an OnStar/StarLink/BMW Assist Remote/etc Telemetry System continuously sending data over 3G or LTE. Conveniently, the manufacturers already sell this data in an "anonymised" form. ( cough Otonomo cough Wejo). Private companies are so much scarier than the NSA when it comes to privacy -- you have none -- your life's data is to be…

> Private companies are so much scarier than the NSA when it comes to privacy -- you have none -- your life's data is to be mined, brokered, and sold to the highest bidder.

Intel agencies privatize their spying to get around warrants. Private companies spying on you are not a far step from the NSA spying on you directly.

> The NSA only cares about you if you are talking to a small number of known hostile foreign people who are already a party to a FISA warrant.

Hah. If you have any political aspiration at all, you are a potential target. FBI lied to attain FISA warrants, and the lawyer responsible got a slap on the wrist. DC juries will never convict one of their own, there is zero accountability at this point.

Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Replacing parts in a laptop absolutely does not void your warranty no matter what the manufacturer says.

What do you mean "no matter what the manufacturer says"? If the manufacturer says your warranty is void - it is. If they broke a law in doing so is a separate issue that you would have to battle out in court. When your 800$ laptop's speakers start buzzing and the service center says you need to pay 80$ for the repair because the tamper seal on the RAM was broken, are you really going to spend 30k and a year of your f…

If you can get the big company to say they're denying the warranty for that reason in writing, you could probably find a no-win, no-pay lawyer to file an eight digit class action lawsuit.

They know that as well as you do. I've found they usually do more passive aggressive / ambiguous stuff than overtly break the law.

Once we had a Toshiba laptop with a bad motherboard. They replaced it with some other board that didn't have drivers for Linux, or even for Windows.

Lenovo took over thirty days to repair my IBM thinkpad (broken screen connector), and when it came back, the high voltage screen transformer was shorted to the case, so it shocked the heck out of me when I turned it on.

On top of that, they didn't replace the broken screen connector, and claimed it was "no fault". This was after the local lenovo repair people found the fault, and lenovo said they couldn't ship the required part.

Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Works just fine. The major German carmakers have an alliance to share data, and treat cars as roving sensor networks. The data is used for improved road safety (real-time traffic jam awareness) and also so premium clients can find parking spots.

Do you have a source for these claims? Without informed consent, they would be significant breaches of both national data protection legislation and the GDPR.

I do not know for cars, but some major news websites in France and Germany are still not GDPR compliant (no cookie consent), yet nothing happens.

Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a source for these claims? Without informed consent, they would be significant breaches of both national data protection legislation and the GDPR.

People tend to VASTLY overstate what sort of protections you get under the GPDR, to the point that I tend to assume nobody has actually read the regulations built off it. In this case, there is no protection for data from your car, beyond the fact that carmakers don't want to share it. Writing regulations to cover it is being done now, and the tug of war is between giving any company who wants it access and giving co…

This is nonsense. The protections of both national and EU regulations apply to personal data collected via your car.

I can only ask that you refrain from spreading misinformation - it muddies the waters.

Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now they just ask your cell phone company.

I'm guessing that nearly everybody knows this by now, and for those occasional times when burying a body or whatever, would leave the phone at home.

Down here there was a murder case recently. The suspect always replied prompt on his messages, except for the 2 hours during that murder. His phone was supposedly at home with him being out.

There were many more juicy bits in that case, but this part is somewhat in the context of the discussion. The message seemed to be, plan better next time :)

Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a source for these claims? Without informed consent, they would be significant breaches of both national data protection legislation and the GDPR.

I do not know for cars, but some major news websites in France and Germany are still not GDPR compliant (no cookie consent), yet nothing happens.

There's definitely a decided lack of enforcement across the bloc. Location data collected via vehicle telemetry would be a significant breach, though.

Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People tend to VASTLY overstate what sort of protections you get under the GPDR, to the point that I tend to assume nobody has actually read the regulations built off it. In this case, there is no protection for data from your car, beyond the fact that carmakers don't want to share it. Writing regulations to cover it is being done now, and the tug of war is between giving any company who wants it access and giving co…

This is nonsense. The protections of both national and EU regulations apply to personal data collected via your car. I can only ask that you refrain from spreading misinformation - it muddies the waters.

Read the article I linked yourself, no misinformation.

Quoting:

The contest is entering a pivotal phase as EU regulators look to hammer out the world's first laws for the ballooning industry around web-enabled vehicles, pitting carmakers against a coalition of insurers, leasing companies and repair shops.

[...]

Car manufacturers, guarding their gatekeeper role in accessing data from their vehicles, have resisted specific regulations for in-vehicle data, saying that protecting consumers is paramount.

"Europe's auto industry is committed to giving access to the data generated by the vehicles it produces," said a spokesperson for the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association (ACEA). "However, uncontrolled access to in-vehicle data poses major safety, (cyber) security, data protection and privacy threats."

Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#228
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost every car I’ve recently owned and/or rented has this option: unlock the car, then hold down the unlock button to roll all the windows down (and in some models, additionally open the sunroof).

Why on earth?

I hate it when it's operated by remote, but it's really nice to do it with the key in the lock. If you have to leave your car outside in the sun and you know it won't be raining, you can easily crack all the windows 1.5 inches or so to let the heat easily escape your car.

Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#229
post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks also, I get it now. I used to do this manually sometimes in the Netherlands to warm up the ice to make it easier to scrape off. But it involved the spare key to relock it while running and also to set the heat to full blast. We never get minus 40 though and where I live now it doesn't even freeze :) And as we also have pretty tiny engines here, it takes a long time to heat up this way because first the cooling…

Note that, for emmesions, heating up the car in stationary is actually positive. It prevents driving a car with a cold engine. Cold engines cause horrible inefficiency in cars. It's one of the reasons why city driving is worse for mileage and emissions than highway driving. Shorter trips.

But then you cause those bad emissions in your car park while it's heating up :)

I don't there is a big benefit overall.

Re: Help me identify possible tracking device found in my car

#230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is nonsense. The protections of both national and EU regulations apply to personal data collected via your car. I can only ask that you refrain from spreading misinformation - it muddies the waters.

Read the article I linked yourself, no misinformation. Quoting: The contest is entering a pivotal phase as EU regulators look to hammer out the world's first laws for the ballooning industry around web-enabled vehicles, pitting carmakers against a coalition of insurers, leasing companies and repair shops. [...] Car manufacturers, guarding their gatekeeper role in accessing data from their vehicles, have resisted spec…

I did read the article. It doesn't make the same claims that you do, and - strangely - it doesn't superceded national and EU regulation.
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