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To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

money.com

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Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#11

Post by loeg »

mholt wrote: post #6

Utah views EV drivers as tax evaders because they don't buy gas. So they have a "deal" for EV drivers: pay an exorbitant registration fee (hundreds more than other vehicles) or install an OBD device in your car and carry a surveillance app to be charged for how much your vehicle is driven [0]. The measurement route requires 2 separate accounts with 3rd parties, one of which has your payment information on file. Given…

> pay an exorbitant registration fee (hundreds more than other vehicles)

By which you mean $130 (equating to ~13,000 miles driven under the 1 cent-per-mile pricing)?

https://roadusagecharge.utah.gov/faq.php#fees

I agree it should be easier and more privacy-preserving to measure real usage (e.g., an odometer read once a year or something like that).

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#12

Post by celeritascelery »

A few years ago our insurance would give us a discount if we added a small monitoring device to the car for 2 months. We agreed and at the end of the time we mailed it back to them. Now we have switched companies and the new one doesn’t have a discreet device, but instead want me to install an app that has 24 hour access to my location on my phone. That was too much for me. So instead a bought the cheapest android phone I could find, and installed the app on that and left it in the car.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#14

Post by oatmeal1 »

This is one of the least bad invasions of privacy I've seen. It shifts the burden of insurance premiums more towards those likely to cause accidents, and incentivizes people to minimize dangerous behavior behind the wheel. There are actual benefits to responsible people, and to society at large, which is not something you frequently see with invasion of privacy.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#15

Post by javajosh »

aidenn0 wrote: post #2

It feels to me more and more like you need to be rich to afford living without bartering away your personal information. I'm getting to be middle aged now, and have noticed a fatalistic attitude towards this by gen Z; kind of "it's impossible to maintain privacy, so I might as well milk my loss of privacy for all it's worth." And I'm wondering now if that's not completely correct.

It may appear that way, but even privacy-for-profit schemes are illusory. The devices still send the data, it is still collated. Eventually this will effect the elites personally and negatively, someone will slip up with their parallel construction, and then we'll see real change in the US. Sadly, not before then.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#16

Post by renewiltord »

aidenn0 wrote: post #2

It feels to me more and more like you need to be rich to afford living without bartering away your personal information. I'm getting to be middle aged now, and have noticed a fatalistic attitude towards this by gen Z; kind of "it's impossible to maintain privacy, so I might as well milk my loss of privacy for all it's worth." And I'm wondering now if that's not completely correct.

No you can just get a cheaper car. You can get one for like $5k and the insurance won't be a lot. Just get minimums.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#17

Post by parl_match »

mholt wrote: post #6

Utah views EV drivers as tax evaders because they don't buy gas. So they have a "deal" for EV drivers: pay an exorbitant registration fee (hundreds more than other vehicles) or install an OBD device in your car and carry a surveillance app to be charged for how much your vehicle is driven [0]. The measurement route requires 2 separate accounts with 3rd parties, one of which has your payment information on file. Given…

> Utah views EV drivers as tax evaders because they don't buy gas

That's because they kind of are. Road taxes are often use-based, where gasoline is the way they extract "use" taxes.

EVs also wear roads more than gas cars do, on average, because of their higher weight. And it's not linear wear per pound, either.

This is going to require a significant shift about how states and cities think about their road maintenance budgets and the taxes required to sustain them. A lot of states are going to, predictably, get this wrong.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#18

Post by loeg »

throwaway1777 wrote: post #9
mholt wrote: post #6

Utah views EV drivers as tax evaders because they don't buy gas. So they have a "deal" for EV drivers: pay an exorbitant registration fee (hundreds more than other vehicles) or install an OBD device in your car and carry a surveillance app to be charged for how much your vehicle is driven [0]. The measurement route requires 2 separate accounts with 3rd parties, one of which has your payment information on file. Given…

That actually kinda makes sense. EVs should pay their share to use the roads too.

(Gas taxes are a relatively small fraction of roads funding, for what it's worth.)

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#19

Post by monksy »

mholt wrote: post #6

Utah views EV drivers as tax evaders because they don't buy gas. So they have a "deal" for EV drivers: pay an exorbitant registration fee (hundreds more than other vehicles) or install an OBD device in your car and carry a surveillance app to be charged for how much your vehicle is driven [0]. The measurement route requires 2 separate accounts with 3rd parties, one of which has your payment information on file. Given…

It's amazing how nosey Utah is. They want to scan your DL to find out who's buying alcohol, they're demanding id based age verification for watching porn online, and apparently they want to enforce monitoring on your phone+car.

Re: To save money on insurance, drivers agree to intrusive monitoring technology

#20

Post by imgabe »

oatmeal1 wrote: post #14

This is one of the least bad invasions of privacy I've seen. It shifts the burden of insurance premiums more towards those likely to cause accidents, and incentivizes people to minimize dangerous behavior behind the wheel. There are actual benefits to responsible people, and to society at large, which is not something you frequently see with invasion of privacy.

Assuming the data is only ever used for its stated purpose and not anything else…
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