Carmakers Will Give Your Location to Police Without a Warrant, Senators Say
thedrive.com
thedrive.com
I'm not aware of any law (in the US) that prohibits you from disabling these things in a vehicle you own. Is it actually illegal?
But I don't know if a modification to the software is actually necessary or if that's what OP was getting at. Just speculating.
If manufacturers really want to collect this data, they currently have the power to stop you.
Even if you could hold the manufacturers liable, I'm guessing most of them would still take that risk.
Personally, the inclusion of surveillance as a standard feature in cars means that I won't buy cars made so recently. It's easier to do that than to worry about disabling stuff. If that becomes impossible for some reason, I suppose that my driving days are over.
One more thought, in California one can request a copy of one's data and also request that it be deleted. Has anybody in CA requested a copy of all the data that has been collected? How much data per month or day does it collected? Has anybody requested that their data be deleted? Would this make it difficult the manufacturer to train the driving assistance AI if enough people requested that their data be deleted?
The sharkfin style antenna pod is typically a PCB with several different antennas on it: https://p.globalsources.com/IMAGES/PDT/B1188507781/Shark-fin...
But for most cars today, removing the antenna would require removing the dash and radio, possibly voiding the warranty or a lease agreement if you have one.
Interesting comment about AI training data... surely that would violate GDPR.
> Who do you call to have that service disabled? No one knows.
If you're not too squeamish about this sort of thing, you could likely find out how to disable this yourself in your vehicle with a web search.
If you aren't comfortable with that, I'd bet that any serious motorhead would likely be able to help, as would any independent auto shop.
There is a procedure to disable the DCM and restore at least the speaker, but it involves partial disassembly of the dashboard.
That seems like a really small price to pay, honestly. I'd just install an aftermarket stereo and call it a day.
Although I understand if others think that price is too hefty. We all decide for ourselves what we're willing to put up with.
The vast majority of the population cannot and will not do this.
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/simpler-solution-for-dis...
If there is a secret involved in this it would be undocumented commands sent by the network to phones that then interpret them as commands to connect to the network, plus baseband processors the periodically look for such commands. They don't radiate, so very little power is used, but they should be entirely dormant.
If the baseband is still powered, I can only assume it is simply sending (or responding to) periodic commands that do not require network authorization, which could possibly still let the network know where you are even without involving any roaming charges.
https://9to5mac.com/2021/07/21/ios-15-here-are-the-devices-t...
A light sensor is used determine the amount of sunlight streaming and heating the interior.
GPS data is used to help calculate the angle of the sun, and determine which areas are likely to be heated the most, and thus needs more cooling.
A compass can be used to make it work even when the car is stationary (when GPS heading is unavailable).
A singular interior temperature sensor can be used for feedback, injecting some truth to balance things out.
It may seem far fetched or even fanciful -- functionality that only exists on very expensive or exclusive brands, or very new vehicles.
But as long as the GPS receiver and nav system exist on a network, and multi-zone HVAC is a thing in a given chassis, then the rest is mostly just software that is free (for the manufacturer) to copy and use.
Thus, Honda has been doing this stuff for at least twenty years now on fairly pedestrian vehicles.
The Honda factory service manual for my 2007 Odyssey touches on these operations, including diagnosing issues. It does not have an ISBN number that I can find.
These systems (multi-zone HVAC, navigation) seem to have been introduced in MY 2004, remaining mostly unchanged until MY 2008 when (at least) the navigation was facelifted and the rear HVAC zone became more autonomous.
Anyway, within volume 2 of that manual is this passage:
i-Dual Zone and i-Tri Zone Climate Control system (With navigation system) The "i-Dual zone" climate control system automatically controls the temperature and the vent mode of the air direction to the driver's and passenger's side, depending on the angle of the sun, and the direction of the vehicle. It calculates information such as date, time, longitude, and latitude from the navigation system, as well as the radiant strength of the sun from the sunlight sensor, to determine the appropriate mode position and temperature to be directed to each side. The "i-Tri zone" climate control system is an addition of the automatic controls with the temperature and the vent mode of the air direction to the rear section to the "i-Dual zone" climate control system.
...and if I'd read something like that in 2004 (or in 2007), I simply wouldn't have believed it. Even now in 2024 it seems either a bit far-fetched or blatantly obvious, with very little middle-ground -- especially for a vehicle that can't even turn its own headlights on and off or adjust dash lighting intensity based on apparent daylight conditions (as Chevy and BMW were variously doing over a decade prior).
(Other parts of the Honda manual describe the in-car temperature sensor.)
Regardless, most of my around-town trips I do by bicycle.
There’s a shocking number of ways to track a person in their vehicle before we even get down to the license plate. If most people here on HN don’t know about them, the general public is obviously completely unaware.
https://tti.tamu.edu/researcher/now-taking-it-to-the-streets...
And even the TPMS sensors in valve stems: They go on their merry way, broadcasting their unique ID (and tire pressure) to anyone who cares to listen.
It's all quite real, and it is pervasive.
The only question is: Who, if anyone, is listening and keeping track?
Sorry your honor, your government's own data proves I could not have been at Jimmy's house where this crime took place.
Naively...
Is it illegal to cut the power to the GPS unit?
I do not see why a car needs a GPS built in. So why can I not simply disable it?
What am I missing?
Is there one?
What will be interesting, is if they ever use the data to give you tickets. I know that there was a discussion of a plan to use the New Jersey Turnpike tollbooths/EZ-Pass to judge speed between two points, and mail you a ticket. I don't think it ever made it out of the starting gate.
I understand
But if nobody breaks bad laws they will never change
Vice laws are a case in point
Also have a little issue with things like speeding laws and the police not even following them. I was almost hit by a cop blowing a stop sign literally yesterday.
My concern is more that it's ripe for parallel construction in cases that otherwise wouldn't make it out of the gate.
The biggest issue with LPRs, is the private corporations that run the infrastructure, sell the data to non-law enforcement people.
Basically, license plates were designed to give authorities the ability to match the car with an owner, and are designed to be public, but the matching data is supposed to be behind a lock. LPRs simply supercharge the collection of the data, but they have contracted out the matching, and those contractors seem to be using what is supposedly a “locked” ability, to make money.
I can also go get an inkjet printer to produce paper that has your tag number on it, slap it over my license plate and get all the ALPR systems to immediately flag my vehicle as your location.
Probably a crime, but also going to quickly poison the entire dataset
The big databases are unlikely to retain pictures that may be used to prove innocence -- so coupled with the legal principle that computers are presumed to be operating correctly these are nothing more than automatic probable cause machines with no upside.
IIRC the closest thing you get to that on the EZPass system is speeding through a toll plaza when they were still a thing flying through the low speed readers.
Today (the present), we do know that this particular MA law has not changed.
We cannot know that it will change.
Tracking plates is a lot more work.
The problem with police is their power asymmetry and potential for abuse. Tools like this increase that. Additionally, they aren't just random people from the public, they're the people that desired to do policing for motivations which may or may not be healthy.
Also, NY has operational speed cameras while NJ doesn't:
https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/speed-camer...
Location metadata can and will be used for Kafkaesque tracking of people for economic and surveillance purposes, guilt by proximity including charging people with crimes, putting people on various kinds of watchlists, and pre-crime harassment.
Norway does this a lot, the Netherlands too I think. Germany saw a significant reduction of accident rates in a trial project.
It used to be impractical to track cars to fine granularity. Now that it is practical: maybe we want that?
Cars are multi-ton, incredibly-expensive pieces of hardware that operate on shared roadways. There are about 42,000 deaths related to operating them each year. Increased tracking would simplify the challenges of
* Finding stolen vehicles
* Discovering the truth in accidents
* Identifying unsafe drivers and removing them from the road
* Identifying unsafe areas of the roadway and improving them
Perhaps there is previously-inaccessible net societal good in not treating cars as a private space when they're operating on public roads that we should be tapping? There's already precedent for it; the legal reason the cops need a much lower standard to search your car than search your house is, practically, it's much easier to commit a crime and then exit the jurisdiction because the vehicle is mobile.
So perhaps we should extrapolate that reasoning. Perhaps rights to privacy should be curtailed in the operation of large vehicles on public roadways. Maybe the status quo is bad, actually.
Agreed. In the current status quo, it is abused by car owners who get away with literal murder.
> should cops be allowed to kick your door and search your home at any time because they think you’re a criminal?
No, but my home is my private space; I'm not driving my home down a shared road. Compare and contrast the relatively lax requirements to get a driver's license with the incredibly stringent rules around getting a pilot's license; the government has existing broad authority to regulate access to public thoroughfares and the use of heavy machinery when such use could jeopardize the health and safety of others.
And what is your argument? We should let the surveilance replace the driver exam? As in "you didn't speed this month, we'll let you keep your license" ?
> You didn't speed this month we'll let you keep your license
Honestly, why not? Professional drivers are monitored; let's extend that to every vehicle on the road.
We could have that inequality and a safer road at the same time as opposed to just the inequality.
As it stands right now, those who should be trusted the least are the least monitored.
If the car gives my location and speed, only those people will be able to break the law and I won't. More inequality than now.
... oh, are you assuming their car will be allowed on the road without the tools to properly track it? I was assuming that as those tools become cheap they become mandatory to operate on public roads (i.e. toll roads or passive highway traffic monitors can serve as checkpoints: scan car transponders and license plates, match them up, identify vehicles on the road without transponders, flag them for intercept by police. Or, easier: transponder functionality is an inspection requirement and if your transponder is out, you don't pass inspection and you can't legally operate on public roads).
So as an absurd example: perhaps there is a net societal good in not treating a house with children in it as a private space? Most children are abused by their parents or other close relatives - shouldn't we want to protect children from their abusers?
> tiring
Drink a coffee or something, the articles will continue until there is either reform or a suspension of the first ammendment.
https://cwbchicago.com/2024/05/bucktown-hit-and-run-bentley-...
Fortunately my car has a manual transmission, so chances are any idiot kid who tries to hop in my car and steal it will give up a few seconds after they realize that they have no idea how to operate it.
For many people, even though insurance is just supposed to "make you whole" they end up with a better result after a payout, even with a $500 deductible or whatever.
Often actual theft is deductible-free.
The cops could absolutely track it. License plate readers are built into most cop cars and parking enforcement vehicles, they could call the carmaker, they could view cctv from the area, whatever. If it was something they actually cared about - like one of their cars, or a cop killer, or their promotion was riding on it - they'd track it down. It's just not worth the time for them to do it, probably because there's too many car thefts and not enough time given to them to look into them.
Maybe where you live that's true. Try going somewhere in upstate NY, or deep in West Virginia. The tracking technology is unevenly distributed.
Destined for a chop shop? Even if they do track it all they'd see is it leaving the city, never to be seen again.
... now, if the data were, say, aggregated somewhere with low friction to police access...
The difference is that here, the police refuse to help if it's not a life-threatening emergency. I had the position of some AirPod Pros with an AirTag attached, and I watched it commute to a house. The police here refused to do anything about it.
Another time, they refused to do anything about a stream of idiot tourists driving the wrong way on a one-way street right in front of them who couldn't get to anywhere, causing gridlock.
If you ever want your stolen property back here, you must get a weapon and collect it yourself.
If they any country’s secret service hasn’t used it to kill a political opponent in a “sad car crash”, then they’re stupid.
I think the keyword here is easier. Probably far more scalable too. A car only moves when someone is driving it. Correlate this with phone location, if you have it, and you can be pretty certain you got your victim.
The amount of spying and protectionism built into these cars makes me uncomfortable with owning one. While there are manufacturers like Aptera who are claiming to want to buck this trend by offering mail-order replacement parts, I'm convinced that I should just weld together my own rolling chassis and build a modern electric horseless carriage. It's insurance and safety concerns that give me pause. People in my state drive like maniacs on the best of days. A home built car, regardless of how much over-engineering I put into it, will likely be less safe in a collision than a modern car.
In my Tesla, I am quite literally, being watched every time I drive. There is a tiny camera behind the rearview mirror. I have to assume that my vehicle will collect data that could be used against me in court. It's a weird shift, going from a completely analog & disconnected vehicle now to an internet-connected tracking device. You truly think about every move -- e.g. "Gee, I hope my insurance company doesn't misinterpret this 'hard braking event' as me being an irresponsible driver."
They always have, for a long time. Exploring event data recorders is an interesting art to get into and put together how crashes play out, sensor-by-sensor.
To play along at home: https://crashdatagroup.com/ -- amusingly, one of the referrals mentioned on the page was essentially "Someone hit my parked car and then claimed I was driving it at the time" -- the EDR sounds like it saved them from a fraudulent claim.
The scale at which data collection now happens is unprecedented. The fact that data collection and sharing is now a continuous process is unprecedented.
claiming that this has always been the case is disingenuous.
My stepdaughter was involved in a he-said, she-said collision in a lighted intersection. "I believe I had the green light", "no, I believe I had".
So me, thinking, talking to insurer, "While not definitive, if the EDR shows that she was a complete stop for 30s before moving, that might show she was stopped at a red, and then went when it turned green".
Insurer: unless we're looking at six digits in a claim, we're not pulling EDR data.
They did treat it as a not-at-fault collision, because fault could not be determined, but still.
Tesla will make you fight them to get access to your own EDR data. But will hold press conferences where they'll tell the world all about your EDR data if they think it will move the spotlight away from AP/FSD (fatal accident a few years ago where they were suspected to be involved. Tesla holds a press conference, "Akshually, the vehicle had told the driver to be more attentive". And it had. But Tesla didn't mention that it had only done that once. And that that one time was EIGHTEEN MINUTES prior to the collision. They just wanted to make it sound like an irresponsible driver.)
Fascinating. You'd think that would be the first thing used before any humans even speak.
The Amish stand out. But mc32 driving a 1998 Volvo with no cell phone does not stand out.
What is "mc32"?
https://www.tesla.com/legal/privacy
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/11/technology/carmakers-driv... | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39666976
https://www.ftc.gov/policy/advocacy-research/tech-at-ftc/202...
Edit: Obligatory political process call to action: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40203558
(own Teslas, have submitted comments to Senator Wyden and the FTC on the topic, responsible for data security and privacy at a fintech, thoughts and opinions are my own)
Cars knowing their own location can be really useful, but why does the manufacturer need to know about it? and to begin with, why are they allowed to know about it?
Yes.
I don't understand how this practice is legal. There really should be a way to request that my driving data is deleted, or at least opt-out from having it sold.
I've also been trying to get LexisNexis to share a copy of my consumer file with me - which they refuse to do because of "identity verification" purposes, even though they don't ask any questions on the form to establish identity. I feel like they're intentionally making it hard for individuals to see what data they have on them.
https://www.reuters.com/technology/tesla-workers-shared-sens...
Mozilla report has more:
https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/tesla/
It's troubling that basically every major auto maker has some flavor of privacy invasive tech that can't be turned off.
Good to know, but legally this can change whenever Tesla wants, no?
I agree that facts are facts and weigh a lot, I can’t exactly shut off the human nature in me that simply does not trust anything that guy controls.
This reminds me of the "Thought Police" from 1984.
Because in the novel "1984", the slogan "Big Brother is watching you." literally contradicts that statement of yours.
Wikipedia writes:
> The ubiquitous slogan "Big Brother is watching you" serves as a constant reminder that Party members are not entitled to privacy. They are subject to constant surveillance to ensure their ideological purity. This is primarily through omnipresent telescreens that provide two-way video communication and constantly blare propaganda.
The only person to blame is yourself.
I'm not saying companies should be allowed to do this, we really need a comprehensive privacy bill of rights, but you don't have to buy this crap that tracks you.
Making this kind of circuit mandatory and hopefully a default that you have to switch on is the solution to keep both groups happy.
I can dig up the article that shows the schematic if anyone needs evidence
Oh man, I had one of those boxes insurance companies send out to record you so you can qualify for lower rates for a couple weeks (my wife signed us up for it) and I felt like I was driving so much more dangerously with it on. But all my graphs would have been reeeeeal smooth.
Can you not cover it, or do you lose some functionality if you do so?
please less ranting and more substance
> In my Tesla, I am quite literally, being watched every time I drive.
this is somehow new ?
> an internet-connected tracking device
yes, the phone has emboldened these products and the gloves are "off"
I can see that coming, thanks starlink /s
Speaking of remote control, this opens up ton of possibilities, specially for farmers, it already exist and i feel like we are not talking about it enough
Enough of these new javascript projects, let's promote more HW projects