Automakers Like TOTALLY Promise Not To Abuse The Ocean Of Location Data Their Cars Now Collect

Privacy

from the trust-us,-we're-the-auto-industry dept

Hoping to assuage growing fears that vehicle data won’t be abused, nineteen automakers recently got together and agreed to a set of voluntary principles they insist will protect consumer privacy in the new smart car age. Automakers promise that the principles, delivered in a letter to the FTC (pdf), require that they “implement reasonable measures” to protect collected consumer data, both now and as the industry works toward car-to-car communications. The principles “demonstrate the industry’s commitment to its customers” and “reflect a major step in protecting consumer information” insists the industry.

Should you bother to actually read the principles, the promised revolution in privacy protection quickly become less apparent. While the principles do require that automakers clearly communicate with customers (and by clear they mean “hey, here’s some fine print saying we’re selling your location data now”), many don’t appear to actually do much of anything. Like this particular gem:

“Data Minimization, De-Identification & Retention: Participating Members commit to collecting Covered Information only as needed for legitimate business purposes. Participating Members commit to retaining Covered Information no longer than they determine necessary for legitimate business purposes.”

With “legitimate business purposes” being whatever they see fit, that doesn’t mean much. Similarly, the industry’s “groundbreaking” promises are also heavily peppered with the ambiguous word “reasonable,” which can of course mean whatever they’d like it to mean:

“Participating Members commit to implementing reasonable measures to protect Covered Information against unauthorized access or use.”

Aka, we’ll make some kind of ambiguous effort to secure your data. As with most efforts of this type, the goal is to preempt government from crafting new (or enforcing existing) privacy protections as the industry moves into more aggressive ways of monetizing location data. Said promises unsurprisingly aren’t easing the worries of both safety and privacy advocates as we move into the vehicle black box age, notes the Associated Press:

“Industry officials say they oppose federal legislation to require privacy protections, saying that would be too “prescriptive.” But Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said legislation is needed to ensure automakers don’t back off the principles when they become inconvenient. “You just don’t want your car spying on you,” he said. “That’s the practical consequence of a lot of the new technologies that are being built into cars.”

With many parts of this technology DRM locked, users won’t have much control over or access to their own data (something the EFF is trying to fix with their latest slate of DMCA exemption requests). It’s also worth noting this supposed circle of automotive trust was already quite rusted before cars became more intelligent; most car dealerships and garages are paid by Carfax to report vehicle mileage and accident repair, with Carfax in turn being paid for that data by insurance companies. Similarly most of the in-car infotainment systems rely on cellular chipsets from companies like AT&T and Verizon, who quite happily sell any and all location data that isn’t nailed down, and consistently experiment with creative new privacy violations (despite very similar promises they’d be on their best behavior).

So while it’s very sweet that the auto industry is promising to respect your privacy as they push into brave new data snoopvertising and location data tracking territory, like so many self-regulatory promises before it they likely aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on.

Filed Under: automakers, cars, privacy, self-regulations, smart cars, tracking