Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf] • Hacker News Board

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#201

Post by tw04 » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 1:20 AM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #143

Scaevolus wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIRC the amounts involved were absolutely pitiful compared to the reputational damage-- they were being paid on the order of $10/car/year.

What reputational damage? I know it's a number that gets calculated on cybersecurity assessment sheets, but I've never seen it being in any way connected to reality. Best I can tell, the actual reputational damage is almost universally $0. Security breaches are non-actionable oopsies - unless your product is literally preventing such breaches[0], it's going to be seen as a random event that has no bearing on customer…

They don’t exactly have a captive audience. Besides the corvette, their competitors pretty much universally have a drop in replacement.

Changing cars is a heck of a lot easier than a corporation ripping out software that they likely have a 3-year contract on, and would require millions in services on top of just eating the cost of the contract itself.

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#202

Post by olalonde » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 1:40 AM UTC

stainablesteel wrote: post #101

subsubzero wrote: post #41

Fun fact, as a owner of a GMC auto I got a innocent looking email about the discontinuation of the Onstar Smart driver service which was the service in question that violated many US laws and sent data to insurance companies without customers authorization. I hope this hits GM really hard as this type of behavior will never cease until massive amounts of money is extracted from the perpetrators(GM etc).

its not just that i don't want electronics built into cars i don't want data coming from my car i don't need a phone to be built into my car i don't need navigation to be built into my car they need to stay in their lane we need anti-enshittification laws

You're definitely not a typical consumer.

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#203

Post by bobthepanda » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 1:40 AM UTC

vel0city wrote: post #188

bobthepanda wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Realistically, the other person ends up in jail and then you still can’t get compensated for car repairs. It’s not super clear why that would be better than the pooling of risk that happens today that results in compensation. American society has chosen to create a built environment that is inhospitable to anything else except driving, so I don’t think this is actually a real choice. The people who are getting into c…

I'm saying they should face such extreme penalties it's not worth it anymore and have it policed so those people aren't on the roads in the first place to get in a collision. Right now you're pretty much not going to have anything happen driving without insurance unless you get into an accident that you can't escape from. If it was highly likely for someone to face judgement every time they went out you'd probably ha…

Then you basically just have a roving class of jobless people stuck at home.

We’re not talking about the currently uninsured. We’re talking about a “hot-take” proposal to significantly increase the amount of uninsured people today, people who today can get insurance.

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#204

Post by akira2501 » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 1:41 AM UTC

EvanAnderson wrote: post #140

akira2501 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why aren't companies treated the same? It's more of a hostage negotiation. You want to hurt the company and it's owners, but if you sue too hard, you're likely to just hurt it's workers and it's customers. It's why preventing companies from reaching _anything near_ monopoly size is so important for corporate jurisprudence. "Too big to fail" is just the tip of this insane iceberg we've allowed to grow into our econo…

> You want to hurt the company and it's owners... The owners of big companies include lots of pension plans, index funds, etc. Hurting those owners, who didn't have any say in the bad decisions, is probably not what we want. Jail for executives who approve or have knowledge of illegal activities sounds good to me.

If they are willing to accept the profits than they must also accept the risks. Otherwise you're just vouchsafing the hostage negotiation because of one level of indirection.

Ideally, the people responsible for managing the money on behalf of these institutions end up bearing most of the responsibility.

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#205

Post by autoexec » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 1:55 AM UTC

I'm not at all surprised that GM did it. I'm surprised that Texas had a law against doing it though. It looks like it wasn't about the sale of data as much as it was about GM misrepresenting what they were doing. Still, good to see Texas standing up for consumers.

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#206

Post by vel0city » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 2:08 AM UTC

bobthepanda wrote: post #203

vel0city wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm saying they should face such extreme penalties it's not worth it anymore and have it policed so those people aren't on the roads in the first place to get in a collision. Right now you're pretty much not going to have anything happen driving without insurance unless you get into an accident that you can't escape from. If it was highly likely for someone to face judgement every time they went out you'd probably ha…

Then you basically just have a roving class of jobless people stuck at home. We’re not talking about the currently uninsured. We’re talking about a “hot-take” proposal to significantly increase the amount of uninsured people today, people who today can get insurance.

Or we get a stronger political will to no longer force car dependency on everyone when people actually start to understand the real costs of car-centric design.

When the stores and restaurants where rich people shop can't get anyone to work there anymore without paying people the full costs of actually driving far away maybe there will be a will to change things.

Lots of people around the world can go to work without needing a car.

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#207

Post by saagarjha » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 2:08 AM UTC

IncreasePosts wrote: post #43

saagarjha wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps the market should not strive for optimal efficiency then.

Why? You'd probably have better outcomes for everyone with more information. Unsafe drivers might start reigning in their bad habits because it is costing them money every month, and safe drivers will save money. Seems like a win-win. I'd love it if my dash cam could do ALPR and send a video to the registered insurance agency when I see some absolutely ludicrous driving.

Because of the obvious privacy implications, as well as the negative impact it has on the perception of driving. When you enable very precise insurance billing you get all sorts of weird behaviors like “I don’t want to drive through there because I’ll take a hit on my rate” or “slowing down to stop in a way people expect me to is consider a mark against me by the insurance provider, so I will do something surprising”. I think Tesla has (or used to have?) a “driving score” and it often incentivized bad driving that was locally “good” but bad in the context of everyone else on the road.

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#208

Post by kube-system » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 2:18 AM UTC

plasticchris wrote: post #181

kube-system wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the goal is to subsidize a specific population, then that should be a government function via taxes. As I understand, all 50 states require insurers to write high risk drivers policies through assigned risk plans. I guess you could shuffle the money through the state as well, but it seems like an inefficient way to accomplish the same. But really, car insurance and their respective mandates exist to protect the…

Mandatory car insurance is a thing in most of the us, except for New Hampshire and Virginia.

It is mandatory in VA too as of last month.

But yeah, that’s kind of my point. No state (except NH) wants people to be able to run others over, default on any damages, and leave the innocent person screwed. That’s why liability insurance is mandatory, and it’s why (mostly) first-party insurance is not. It is a social safety net.

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#209

Post by s1artibartfast » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 2:19 AM UTC

stainablesteel wrote: post #101

subsubzero wrote: post #41

Fun fact, as a owner of a GMC auto I got a innocent looking email about the discontinuation of the Onstar Smart driver service which was the service in question that violated many US laws and sent data to insurance companies without customers authorization. I hope this hits GM really hard as this type of behavior will never cease until massive amounts of money is extracted from the perpetrators(GM etc).

its not just that i don't want electronics built into cars i don't want data coming from my car i don't need a phone to be built into my car i don't need navigation to be built into my car they need to stay in their lane we need anti-enshittification laws

Too bad new cars are required by law to have a real time internet connection so that the police can track them and execute remote shutdown commands. There's no opting out of government law by selecting a different brand

Re: Texas sues GM for unlawfully collecting and selling drivers' private data [pdf]

#210

Post by Tempest1981 » Thu, Aug 15, 2024, 2:19 AM UTC

Scaevolus wrote: post #94

fooqux wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And not just massive. It needs to be an order of magnitude more than they made from those deals. Too many times companies get slapped on the wrist for an amount considerably less than they made from their illicit activities. Which I never understood. Normal people that get caught doing things like selling stolen goods have to pay a fine on top of all money they may have made from selling it. Why aren't companies trea…

IIRC the amounts involved were absolutely pitiful compared to the reputational damage-- they were being paid on the order of $10/car/year.

Even less... Hyundai: $0.61/car. Honda: $0.26/car. GM: unclear.

I believe this is total/car, not per year. They did it for pennies.

https://www.pcmag.com/news/senators-your-driving-data-may-ha...