Modern cars are packed with technology that collects data about the drivers and the passengers. This data can include location, speed, driving time, driving habits, points of interest visited and much more.
This information can be used by automakers, governments, and marketing companies to track people's movements, personalize ads, and monitor behavior.
Modern cars collect data from a variety of sources, including:
- Sensors: Modern cars are equipped with a variety of sensors, such as cameras, radars and motion sensors. These sensors collect data about the car's surroundings, such as speed, direction, and distance from other objects.
- Connected devices: Modern cars are often connected to the Internet through a mobile network or Wi-Fi. This allows cars to transmit data to automakers' servers or other companies.
- Mobile apps: Mobile apps for cars can collect data about car usage, such as driving time, driving habits, and places visited.
The data collected by modern cars can be used in a variety of ways, including:
- Improved safety: Automakers can use data to improve car safety, such as by developing automatic emergency braking or lane-keeping assist systems.
- Personalization: Automakers can use data to personalize the driver experience, such as by recommending routes or adapting car settings.
- Marketing: Marketing companies may use the data to target ads to drivers, such as by advertising products or services relevant to their interests.
And this Marketing, which the car user is unaware of, is the most dangerous part, since the companies have a huge amount of data on that user that is sold between them. And user privacy is conspicuous by its absence.
The collection of all this data by modern cars raises a number of important privacy issues, including:
- Invisibility: Drivers may not be aware that their data is being collected.
- Lack of control: Drivers have no control over how their data is used, or to whom it is provided. With all the risks that entails.
In theory, there are a number of things drivers can do to protect their privacy in modern cars, such as turning off data collection features: Drivers can turn off some data collection features, such as Internet connectivity or use of mobile applications
But let's not fool ourselves, according to a study carried out by the Mozilla Foundation and published a few weeks ago, current cars are one of the products that have the minimum of privacy. And this fact is clearer than water.
The authorities should force car manufacturers to guarantee the privacy of their customers, and not allow the abuse that currently occurs. It is a shame that our most fundamental rights are increasingly less respected.
For our part, we have to know this, and try to act accordingly.
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