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Data isn't just being collected from your phone, it's being used to score you

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Re: Data isn't just being collected from your phone, it's being used to score you

#91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They recovered their costs. I already pay for the service. Tracking is just another excuse to raise rates, which as you note is the goal (bring money in, don't let it out). When rates have nothing to do with liability is it really insurance? To quote wikipedia: If the likelihood of an insured event is so high, or the cost of the event so large, that the resulting premium is large relative to the amount of protection…

You pay either way. It's not about covering costs to provide a needed service. That would be a public service This is a private company looking for profit. They want to raise your rates.

What you are talking about would no longer be considered insurance.

> the accounting profession formally recognizes in financial accounting standards, the premium cannot be so large that there is not a reasonable chance of a significant loss to the insurer

The vast majority of automobiles do not hold their value, they depreciate over time. If I've had my car for say 5 years and I've paid the premiums for 5 years, I may have already paid the full value of my car as it is today due to depreciation. I probably pay for one minor incident per year in premiums. Unless I total my within the first 5 years I'm not really getting insurance what I'm really getting is a payment plan for a payout I most likely will never get.

Re: Data isn't just being collected from your phone, it's being used to score you

#92

People are complex. If some piece of code is used to predict my employability based on my facial expressions, there's not much to add. It's already as bad as it gets: you can't say/write anything non vanilla in public because 10 years later some HR snooping app will analyze the sentiment on the post and outright reject you. And we all kind of blindly walking into this no questions asked.

Well, I wouldn't say it was blind. About every 2 years you'll find a movie about how insanely stupid it is to post info online. And those types of movies go back pretty far. The problem is how dense people are.

Re: Data isn't just being collected from your phone, it's being used to score you

#93
This should be illegal. The credit unions are bad enough but this is egregious. Software should not be allowed to affect humans without a complete explanation of how it works, how it reached its decision, and a human with authority to appeal to. Frankly, a bunch of the uses here already seem illegal like denying people the ability to rent or to get a job based on some black box software that provides hidden information on people. How can we even know the software isn't something like: if (race === black) deny Application(); Artificial intelligence indeed. From 1820.

Re: Data isn't just being collected from your phone, it's being used to score you

#94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes they would, but the flip side of them not being able to price people based on actual driving behavior is by charging all men higher, all single people higher vs married people, and poor people higher based on credit score. Plus why single out insurance companies and ban them from creepily tracking you wherever you go and not all the other companies who do that with your cell phone. Also to be pedantic, the don't…

I was rear-ended in stop-and-go traffic. The same person was behind me for miles. He was looking at his phone and ran into me - totally and completely not my fault. He refused to give me his insurance info. I made a claim against my own insurance. I'm pretty sure the insurance company went after him and recovered costs. How exactly should that influence my rates? This is exactly why I pay for insurance, service I alr…

> my rates would go up because I accelerate quickly and brake hard when conditions allow

All it takes is for you to misjudge the conditions one time (are you claiming to be infallible?), or for another road user to do something you were unable to anticipate, and suddenly this driving habit of yours does contribute to a higher risk of an incident that results in a claim. (Even if the incident still isn't considered to be your fault; your driving style reduces safety margins for everyone.)

Re: Data isn't just being collected from your phone, it's being used to score you

#96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You pay either way. It's not about covering costs to provide a needed service. That would be a public service This is a private company looking for profit. They want to raise your rates.

What you are talking about would no longer be considered insurance. > the accounting profession formally recognizes in financial accounting standards, the premium cannot be so large that there is not a reasonable chance of a significant loss to the insurer The vast majority of automobiles do not hold their value, they depreciate over time. If I've had my car for say 5 years and I've paid the premiums for 5 years, I m…

I believe most insurance also covers the damage done by your vehicle to other property. So the upper limit on the total collected through premiums is somewhere between 0 and the cost of an expensive house.

Re: Data isn't just being collected from your phone, it's being used to score you

#98
post #9

I feel like the Chinese style social score system won't have enough support in government for most countries, but we'll receive a decentralized version anyway through corporate overreach. Also, it's always amusing to arrive at an article about data collection and be greeted by this: https://i.imgur.com/d4Z4sdd.png

The credit system in the US is already a pretty horrific version of this, and nobody really seems to care and it’s been like this for decades. And it’s not even just used for credit anymore, renting an apartment now usually requires a credit check. I had thought credit karma and similar services were at least adding transparency to the industry but was recently in for a rude awakening when trying to get preapproval f…

> You can check your credit report for free, as required by law, but nobody is required to tell you your credit score. You can also basically just pay to remove many things from your credit report.

There is no “the credit score”. Any lender is free to use whatever scoring algorithm they like. And they do. Some lenders may choose to use certain scores for certain things, but underwriting has no obligation to use one specific credit score.

Therefore there is no reason for people to care about their credit score, whether it be from FICO or credit karma or whoever.

The only thing you should do is make sure information on the credit report is accurate. And what is your source for claiming you can pay to get things removed from credit score? It doesn’t even make sense, as it just shows the status of your lines of credit. You can’t just make a line of credit disappear as no credit reporting agency or financial institution is going to want to commit fraud for any amount of money that an average person might offer.

Re: Data isn't just being collected from your phone, it's being used to score you

#99
When getting insurance quotes, there was a disclosure that a credit check had been conducted, listed the top 4 items affecting my Risk Score, and gave a link for questions. I found the guide to all the possible reasons and was amazed at some of the elements. [1]

* They prefer 84 years of credit history to put you in a lower risk category. Having 2 lines of credit paid every month versus 1 would make a huge difference in this regard.

* Oil company credit cards are seen as very high risk, and even having 1 is seen as a negative.

* Department store credit cards are also viewed negatively.

The weightings and mixing of variables is the secret sauce...but reading through it all made me very happy with my decision to turn down an offer from one of the major reporting agencies.

[1] PDF Warning

https://consumer-solutions.custhelp.com/ci/fattach/get/29038...

Re: Data isn't just being collected from your phone, it's being used to score you

#100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least the Chinese system is out in the open. Many private companies surveilling everyone without anyone's knowledge is terrible. Companies using these scores are really only targeting a group of people that allow the collection to happen. My car insurance company would sure love to put a tracker in my car but there is no way in hell that is going to happen. I'm sure my driving style would qualify me for higher rat…

Yes they would, but the flip side of them not being able to price people based on actual driving behavior is by charging all men higher, all single people higher vs married people, and poor people higher based on credit score. Plus why single out insurance companies and ban them from creepily tracking you wherever you go and not all the other companies who do that with your cell phone. Also to be pedantic, the don't…

Yes they would, but the flip side of them not being able to price people based on actual driving behavior is by charging all men higher

This is illegal in the UK and EU, fortunately. A real victory for gender equality, even if it means women paying more.

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