Modern cars are chock full of sensors and connected to the internet via built-in cellular modems. That’s a recipe for massive data collection. Last September, Mozilla’s Privacy Not Included team released a blockbuster report how much data our cars were gathering and it was absolutely staggering. According to the hard-to-find privacy policies, your car can collect extremely personal information including precise location, contact lists from your phone, call and message data, and – believe it or not – even “sexual activity”. Today, I’ll walk through this report and its implications with the head of Mozilla’s Privacy Not Included project, Jen Caltrider.
Interview Notes
* Mozilla’s Privacy Not Included: https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/
* Mozilla’s car report: https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/articles/its-official-cars-are-the-worst-product-category-we-have-ever-reviewed-for-privacy/
* Mozilla’s report on AI chatbots: https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/articles/happy-valentines-day-romantic-ai-chatbots-dont-have-your-privacy-at-heart/
* Donate to Mozilla Foundation: https://donate.mozilla.org/
* Mozilla layoffs: https://techcrunch.com/2024/02/13/mozilla-downsizes-as-it-refocuses-on-firefox-and-ai-read-the-memo/
* Sign the petition to stop car data gathering! https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/articles/car-companies-stop-your-huge-data-collection-programs-en/
* Bruce Schneier article in Slate: https://slate.com/technology/2023/12/ai-mass-spying-internet-surveillance.html
Further Info
* Get your Firewalls Don’t Stop Dragons Merch! https://fdsd.me/merch
* Give the gift of privacy and security: https://fdsd.me/coupons
* Send me your questions! https://fdsd.me/qna
* Support our mission! https://fdsd.me/support
* Subscribe to the newsletter: https://fdsd.me/newsletter
* Check out my book, Firewalls Don’t Stop Dragons: https://fdsd.me/book
Table of Contents
Use these timestamps to jump to a particular section of the show.
* 0:02:39: What were some top finding from your car privacy report?
* 0:05:14: Which cars did you review and how did you evaluate them?
* 0:09:44: How was I notified and how did I consent to my car’s privacy policy?
* 0:10:39: What are cars tracking? Are electric cars any worse than gas cars?
* 0:13:55: What third party data mining is going on in my car?
* 0:20:41: Is there a way to opt out of data sharing?
* 0:24:10: Is less data collected in Europe?
* 0:26:02: Where is all my data stored? Locally, in the cloud, or both?
* 0:28:52: Is the data at least secured?
* 0:29:48: Can dealerships access my data? What about law enforcement?
* 0:32:28: What about rental or fleet cars? What about passengers?
* 0:37:24: Do car dealers disclose this data collection to shoppers?
* 0:39:11: What are some of the security problems with this data collection?
* 0:45:55: How did car makers and legislators respond to your report?
* 0:48:36: Do modern privacy laws cover auto data?
* 0:50:48: So what can we do about this today?
* 0:54:30: What will Privacy Not Included tackle next?
* 0:58:40: Wrap-up
Hi it’s Jen C rder I’m with milla’s privacy not included welcome and you’re listening to firewalls don’t stop dragons hello there everybody welcome back to firewalls don’t stop dragons I your host har Parker and today we have episode 364 for February 19th 2024 I got a great interview for you today this one
Uh it’s been percolating for a little while ever since that article came out from privacy not included about the horrible horrible state of privacy with modern vehicles uh we’ve already talked to uh Andrea Miko about this a couple times but after that article came out from Mozilla I reached out to them and
Uh Jen C trer very graciously agreed to come on the show and talk all about it so we’re going to dig deep into that today and it’s it’s just horrific and really something has got to be done um so real quick before we get to that interview did you know that you could
Buy your very own firewalls don’t stop dragons merch uh I have not mentioned this in way too long I’m just a horrible marketer uh but yeah hey it’s a thing you can actually get those dragon logo t-shirts and stickers and mugs and hats and tank tops and sweatshirts and
Sweatpants and bags and even teddy bears all sorts of stuff you can buy with my my logo on it now I honestly I don’t make a lot of money on these things at all it’s really more about just kind get my logo out there for me it’s kind of
You know helping other people find out about what we’re doing but hey if you’re a fan of the show there’s some cool stuff in there and uh honestly if if there’s something you would like my logo on that they don’t sell uh or that I
Don’t sell at the merch shop uh just ask I could Pro they sell just about everything so if you’re looking for something in particular that’s not there a style or a color or an item or something let me know and I I can probably add it now they’ve got
Promotions all the time they change from we week to week I think uh I think this week for example I think it’s free shipping I think next week is 20% off maybe I’ve got that backwards they come and go I I don’t control them the
Company I work with to do the merch uh just randomly does these things apparently so anyway if you are interested the quick way to get there is just to go to fdsd domme merch uh and that will take you right there the the new spring line is out you really you
Really should check it out anyway I just had not mentioned that in a long time I I probably should mention it more often anyway let’s get to our wonderful interview with Jen C rer Jen C rder has covered technology as a journalist with CNN and went on to create and Lead mozilla’s wonderfully
Helpful privacy not included project working as a consumer advocate in the realm of security privacy and artificial intelligence welcome to the show Jen hi thanks for having me this is going to be great so you guys dropped what I would call a bombshell report last fall I
Guess it was about privacy in cars and we’ve talked to Andre Miko before about privacy for cars and his efforts there but it was really interesting to see what you guys uncovered and so I want to dig into some of that today and help people understand just what a dumpster
Fire priv privacy is in modern vehicles so all right starting off let tell us a little bit more about uh privacy not included maybe how you came to found it and then tell us some of the like the top level results from your report on car privacy what were your some of your
Top findings well a little bit about me and privacy not included privacy not included was started back in 2017 back when people were starting to have fitness trackers that tracked more than steps and smart speakers that listen to us and we were curious we saw a lot of
Buyer guides out there that reviewed features and reliability and things like that but nothing that reviewed anything about privacy and security from a lot of connected devices that were coming into our homes and we thought well let’s give that a try and Mozilla is you know most
People know Mozilla for Firefox so the you know we’re not known for we at the time we we’ never reviewed products um and so created this little project that we wanted to see if it could work out called privacy not included where we reviewed that first year 48 connected
Products for privacy and security very kind of bare bones we looked at privacy policies and to see what we could find um and then to see if people cared and we were happily surprised that people did care and so since then we’ve evolved privacy not included into a buyer guide
Where we’ve reviewed hundreds of connected devices apps and back in 20 at the end of 2023 the end of last year cars and we try to make it as accessible and fun for people as possible we read all those boring privacy policies so you don’t have to um and we have a creepo
Meter where you can rate how creepy you think things we have a privacy not included warning label to let you know what’s really bad we have a best of category because there are a few good things out there um and mostly we just try and have fun and let consumers know
What good choices they can make which leads us to what we found last year with cars and what we found last year when we reviewed the privacy and security of 25 car brands across 15 car companies was that there were no good choices they were all bad um all the cars we reviewed
Were a privacy nightmare well we’re we’re going to dig into that today so all right so you said you did uh several different car mix and models so how did you determine which of those you’re going to pick I I’m guessing maybe you went for the most
Popular ones um and then how did you determine what data they were collecting and sharing for example like did you have to rely just on reading their privacy policies and maybe other documentation to determine that or was there some way to actually you know directly observe and measure uh what
Sort of data they were given up yeah so just kind of to preface everything privacy not included as a team of three so we’re a very small team um yeah and and when we had to narrow down the cars that we wanted to research we we always
Look at what’s the most popular and because Mozilla is a global or organization we try and not just look at what’s most popular in North America I’m based here in the United States but my research partner Misha is in Berlin um our other research and writer Zoe is in
Toronto so we’re kind of around the globe so but we did look at like what’s most popular and you know from Toyota obviously to BMW Mercedes that are big in Germany as well as here we included Renault they’re very big in Europe but not sold here in North America as much
And yeah and so we just looked at what was popular we had to kind of cut off at some point and unfortunately I caught off Mazda and Volvo and since then I’ve had thousands of people going why didn’t you review Mazda or Volvo and the funny
Thing is in the midst of all this research we end up having to buy a new car and we bought a Mazda and to everybody who’s asked me why didn’t you review Mazda’s privacy I can tell you that Mazda’s privacy is just as bad as
Everybody else’s so and so how did we do our research well because we’re a small team when this started it was a team of one me and so we actually approach this as much as we can from a consumer’s point of view what can you as a consumer
Learn about the privacy of a product before you buy it or download it to inform you about uh what you’re getting if if you were like us and had all day to sit around and read privacy policies and dig through security documents so you know we don’t have any expectation
That that you know consumers can go out and buy the car first and then make a decision or any product or even you shouldn’t even have to download an app to see a privacy policy so that’s how we approached the research with cars we went out and started looking at well
Let’s find their privacy policy and for anybody who’s ever tried to find a privacy policy for a car a lot of people probably thought well I never thought I needed to look at a privacy policy for a car that’s new but when we started our research we we got overwhelmed very
Quickly because it turns out cars don’t just have one privacy policy um they have many there’s a privacy policy for for the car company there’s the privacy policy for the app there’s a privacy policy for the connected services and that’s the connected Services through the cars and then individual connected
Services like Sirius XM or ways or things like that other services like that uh carplay things like that are going to have their own privacy policies there’s the Privacy policies for the insurance the financial services the car dealers and on and on and on and we pretty quickly got overwhelmed and
Noting again that we’re a team of three we had to kind of like build a box that okay we got to focus this and so for our research we focused on researching the Privacy policies and security of the car companies the the car the apps and the connected services
And we kind of left out all that other stuff because it was just too much so we did a lot of reading of of many many many privacy policies I think Toyota 1 for I think we included like 12 11 or 12 privacy policies that we found for them
Um it was very overwhelming and then also looking at you know security information you know what are the documented leaks or hacks or breaches that the companies have had what what have they saying you know there is an automotive industry group and what have they saying so kind of just doing a a
Lot of research and when we started we knew nothing and we didn’t know what we were going to get the idea for the project actually came from a reader in Sweden who had emailed me the year before going hey I love privacy not included have you ever thought about
Reviewing cars and I was like never thought about that and then he shared some of the research he’d done on his own that was really compelling and so that’s kind of what spurred us but when we started we immediately were like this is really bad we’re like why aren’t
People talking about this this is so bad and so I’m glad people are talking about it now absolutely and a lot of privacy is certainly in the United States is built around this concept of notice and consent and so I’m curious how I just
Bought a new car I I turned it on for the first time and put my key in it how am I notified and how did I give consent uh well it depends you might not have seen anything if you didn’t download an app you might have seen a quick flash on
The the screen in the console of your car when you were setting it up maybe when the dealer or the salesperson was there setting up with you and it was just like you know a quick click agree to to kind of move forward and be able
To drive off the lot uh uh Subaru’s privacy policy was interesting because it seemed to indicate that the moment you became as much as a passenger in the car you had consented to their privacy policy so consent with cars is a very is a very sticky situation it’s very hard
To know when when you’ve consented and what exactly you’ve consented to so I I think probably if people thought about it they’d realize that certainly modern cars are chalk full of sensors right they’ve got you know things for measuring temperature inside and outside they’ve got obviously probably emission
Standards that they have to comply to so they’ve got emission sensors and motion sensors for triggering airbags but today they’ve also got precise location built into a lot of them because a lot of cars have GPS s built in and then even more modern cars have got things that monitor
You as a passenger inside the cabin of the vehicle so how might these sensors be used to violate our privacy and I’m just curious are EVS or electric vehicles any worse than than regular cars when it comes to this stuff yeah as far as we can tell a Car
Any car made now or in like the last five years forward whether it’s a smart car whether it’s an electric car or a regular old gas car is still kind of collecting as much data as possible electric cars can collect more information about where you stop and
Charge or when you’re charge and things like that than gas cars but beyond that like you said they all have sensors inside you know they know how much you weigh you know how many passengers you have where you’re going when you’re going there how fast you’re driving when
You’re braking um what you’re listening to you know they have cameras facing in on your face to see if you’re awake they have cameras facing out to tell you if you’re backing into something or if there’s something in front of you you know and then there’s the app um you
Connect your download the app it’s it’s going to collect a lot of location data on you that way as well as additional usage information the connected services like just the data collection is enormous um and it doesn’t stop there you know the the car companies go on to
Say that they can collect data about you from other places within their groups so the car dealer potentially the you know the financial services the you know if you have a Affiliated Insurance data collection can flow that way as well as they can get data from third party sources whether that be government
Sources publicly available information social media data Brokers they say according to their privacy policies that they can collect tons and tons and tons of information on you and some of it can get very personal well one thing you mentioned was charging of electric vehicles and that is something that I’ve
Been I just got on that electric vehicle last year my first one I was very happy to get it um but I knew what I was getting into in terms of there was going to be privacy issues there and to me like filling up a car is the difference between charging a
Flashlight and charging your smartphone you know the flashlight just pure power it’s just got to it’s just you know like gas it’s just I’m just putting fuel into your vehicle there’s no there’s no data when you plug in an electric vehicle it’s like more like a USB connection
There’s power and there’s data and they exchange to the point where a lot of cases if you have it set up right you just plug in your car you don’t have to pay for anything it knows who you are it knows who your car is and you’ve got an
Account with them a card on file and you just plug it in then you go and and so who knows what other data might be exchanged while you’re doing that and so I don’t think that’s something else I don’t think people are thinking about and and the apps with electric vehicles
I mean I with my my new car like we chose not to download and install the app but with electric vehicles I don’t think a lot of people have that option if you want to charge it you’re you need to have the app and so that’s just another place that you’re being tracked
Well and you know some of the really cool features that we had on on cars like you know remote start and uh and things like that we’re on the fob and so that’s fine but there’s so many interesting things you could do with my car L like if I’m sitting at dinner and
I’m about to pay the check and it’s really cold outside I could tell my car warm up to 72 de uh before I get there you know that’s a little different than remote start you know and it’s it could be a 100 yards away you know that would
That a key fob wouldn’t reach and so you need the app for that and they know that and so they put a lot of really cool features in the app and they want you to download the app so all right so let’s let’s formalize this a little bit you’ve
Made mention of other third party things like uh Sirius and carplay uh Android auto and and smartphone apps like you’re saying this is this is more and more common my mom has an ice vehicle internal combustion engine she’s got a regular fuel car but it comes with an
App and the salesman was really pushing hard for her to install that app before she ever left the parking lot you know when she bought the car it’s like oh first thing to do is before you even get the car is let’s install the app and at
The time I told her I wouldn’t I wouldn’t do that like just tell them no and we’ll think about it later but I bet you it’s not going to be much longer than even ice cars you’re you’re almost going to have to to to get the full use
Of the vehicle so anyway um do we know what kind go ahead well I was just going to add because that’s interesting because since our research came out I’ve heard a few anecdotes of people who bought Cars one person who I work with who bought a car and as part of the
Buying process the salesperson pushed her to download the app and mentioned to her that her commission was based on whether was tied to getting her to download and install the app and accept all terms and conditions and it was and it was it wasn’t just download and install but accept all terms and
Conditions and then I was doing yeah it’s very I was doing a radio interview with somebody in Calgary and he mentioned that he had a friend who bought had recently bought a car and the dealer wouldn’t actually let him drive off the lot until he had downloaded and
Installed the app wow and so fortunately for me when we bought our car I had been up front about uh with the with the dealer that I was privacy person and he’s like you want the app and I was like nope and he didn’t push it
So so do we and another one by the way is insurance companies and then you you made a an off fan mentioned of that to a lot of it the old days the insurance companies to get you your preferred driver discount you’d put in this little OBD2 dongle underneath your car and it
Would wirelessly transmit or something to tell them what your driving habits were now they just want you to install the app because it can collect a lot more information from you from doing that so um I know you I think you said this but did you look into it all or or
What’s your sense maybe because it was so overwhelming what other kinds of third party stuff is being collected yeah the third party stuff is something that like we said we kind of had to table a little bit you know just because we didn’t have enough time to
Get into it but we know that that insurance is is one of the big collectors of data and you know you mentioned the the old you know back in the old days what like 10 years ago uh you know I know so long ago you know you
Could opt into that little Insurance fob that they sent you it was like oh I want to discount on my insurance I’ll opt in and get this fob and install it I have the choice I installed it I can yank it out at any time um but now all that’s
Just built in and and our our choice and consent has kind of been removed from us in a lot of ways but you know I heard a rumor in doing the research and I’m hopeful that we’ll have time to look into this deeper in 2023 that Sirius XM
Is a huge data collector um you know they’re not just collecting data I’ve heard I I can’t confirm this so um but I’ve heard that and I want to dig into it um that they’re not just collecting about what you’re listening to on the radio but they collecting data about
Your car and your movements and you’re like well why would the serious xxm need to know about that you know um and and then yeah there’s just so many other the sharing the sharing of information the one that really stood out to us as a as
A big concern um is the sharing with government and law enforcement and the very low bar that a lot of these car companies listed as you know the bar that they would share some very personal information with law enforcement or government and that gets that kind of
Gets like a little more creepy when you think of how that could be used and abused you know we saw one privacy policy uh that mentioned they could share data with law enforcement government based on informal requests and I’m still not sure what an informal request is in my mind it’s like the
Local police officer down at the bar having a beer with you know the car guy and being like hey I’d sure like to get that data on my ex-wife and they’re like that’s an informal request here you go you know hope it’s not that bad but but
It’s hard to tell based when you say you’ll share data with law enforcement government on an informal request it feels like a very low bar well and I think there’s two angles to this and like any data collection stuff that we’ve talked about on this show a lot uh
Is there’s two angles there’s the consumer angle where these companies are publicly traded companies and their shareholders are demanding value and so if there’s money on the table they want to pick it up and that money right now is monetizing your data so they’re going to find any way they can demonetize that
Data but what that does in turn is it enables law enforcement or whether they foreign or domestic I mean this or you know this could be you know Espionage or nation states that data is now there for them to collect as well either through formal means or uh by hacking I guess
And so you know data is going to if you build it they will come these data you know there all this data so so that yeah that is extremely worrying in fact I heard that you know GM has come out and said we’re not going to do carplay or
Android play going forward maybe that was only on their EVS but they they they vely said we’re going to only give you ours you’re going to like take like it uh and they said it was for responsiveness they give all these kind of hand waving things but I think what I
Really heard under the cover is was it was like well no that they want the data and and they so they want direct access to that data so they can monetize it and they because I guess maybe with can carplay and Android auto they don’t have
As much access to it I’m not sure yeah yeah and GM is a very interesting one they’ve done that where they’re they’re they’re cutting out Apple and Android um and and pushing users to their own they’ve also done that with their OnStar system there was a story a couple of
Stories that we read um and as part of our research about how as part of the sticker price users that bought new GM cars were charged the $1,500 for the OnStar connected Services whether they wanted it or not um it was just part of the sticker and and if consumers like
Well I don’t want that there was no way to be like oh no it’s part of the sticker price you you get this now you can not you can choose to not use it but you’re still paying $1,500 for it and it still comes installed and so GM is an
Interesting one and really looking at ways to capture that data and keep people within their own systems to to to get it kind of stinks yeah more than kind of um okay so let let’s say uh I’ve listen to this podcast of buying a new car and I’m like
You know what I’m going to find those privacy policies I’m going to find out where I can opt out I’m going to find those consent dialogues and I’m going to say no is that possible how would I how would I do that and I’m curious to know
If since you said you did a global thing is it is it better for people in Europe I don’t know if European cars are different or if you have to actually be a driver in Europe but is it different there yeah so my short answer is good
Luck opting out um you might be able to opt out of some small things but I’ll use the example of Tesla’s privacy policy is kind of a way that I think the car companies approach this and Tesla’s privacy policy had a line in it a paragraph in it that said hey you bought
This car because it’s connected but we get it if you want to opt out of personal dat collection you sure can here’s how and you’re like great and then you read the rest of that paragraph and it goes on to say however if you do this your car might become inoperable or
Unsafe and you’re like wait a minute that’s that’s not a choice you know and and what what we see with a lot of these car companies uh is they they a lot of these features can be you know safety features a lot of the mar safety features backup cameras is a great
Safety feature um a camera that monitors to see if you’re falling asleep and and notify you is is a good safety feature yeah but you know and some of these other things are useful but what what I think I think we’re seeing is these car companies couple the safety features
With the data collection and don’t give you a way to uncouple them you know and so in a perfect world you’d buy a new car and you’d automatically be opted into all the safety features and automatically be opted out of all the data collection for monetization and
Then be given a very clear choice of hey would you like to have share this data for this you know we’re going to monetize it you know up front but that’s not how it works and you know interestingly after our research came out and and the car companies got a
Little little bit of a black eye I I assume you know they’re they’re there’s an automotive industry group and they put up a they put up a whole page on their website um in response to oh how they’re great at privacy and they had a memo and the memo was we’re we’re about
Safety we’re not spying on you these features are for safety and so they really push this safety angle and and so even if you go to like decup like turn off some of these features you’ll get notifications that will warn you that oh if you turn this off you might lose some
Safety features and I think that kind of scares a lot of people or even if you try and physically disable things cashmir Hill and the New York Times did a great piece at the beginning of the year about how a lot of these features that new connected cars have like
Location tracking and Geo fencing to send alerts if if people leave a certain area can be used by abusers um if you’re an abusive relationship and there was a story of a woman that wanted whose husband was tracking her through her car and and she wanted the company to
Disable that and they wouldn’t so she finally took it to a dealer I mean not to a dealer but an independent mechanic uh to have that disabled and it did disable it it also disabled like her SOS calling so if she was in an accident she
Wouldn’t be able to call for help and it might have also avoided her warranty and so it it’s very tricky the the way these car companies have kind of of created these features that do have some safety impact but coupled them very tightly with data from what I can tell at least
Seemingly coupled them very tightly with data collection to use that data for monetization right okay uh and is it any better in Europe I mean because of gdpr and things like that do they have more rights absolutely Europeans have more rights because of uh their Privacy Law
Gdpr um they have the right to have their data collected um they have the right to you know they have better rights to consent and choice and things like that and so the the one car company on the list that had kind of the best
Privacy and I’m you can’t see me but if you could I’m I’m putting that in in quotes because it’s it’s still far from good was Rena which is a french-based company that doesn’t sell cars in in the US and that’s because they do have to comply to to gdpr they still weren’t
Great I mean you know reading American privacy policies versus reading European privacy policies you learn a lot more when you read our privacy policies um the European ones are a lot more vague because they aren’t as explicit um it talks a lot more about what rights you
Have but a lot less more about data collection and use which is interesting and then there’s the question of for the Europeans is how well is gdpr actually enforced when it comes to cars and I think um car companies carry a lot of weight in Europe much like they do here
In the US um and so the question is how much is gdpr in forc and so how how well are those protections actually protecting people in Europe and and I I’ve heard from a number of people that work on issues over there that they have grave concerns as well gdpr might
Protect them a little bit more but they still don’t feel like it’s near enough and they don’t feel like it’s being enforced well enough yeah enforcement is something that that’s often there’s so many aspects to even if you get the regulations you know you’ve got to not
Only be able to enforce them they have to have teeth but you also have to have funding for example that we do that a lot in this country where if we don’t like something we just dry up their cash and they can’t do anything about it okay
So were you able to determine how like where all this data that’s being collected where is it actually stored like uh for example is it how much of it stored on some sort of a little internal drive on the vehicle maybe somewhere uh versus how much is uploaded to the cloud
Do we have any idea maybe based on the Privacy policies how long this data is retained and then if I wanted to could I ask them to delete my data or or anything along those lines yeah so I’ll admit that we didn’t do a lot of technical digging into the cars cuz we
Just don’t have that technical ability we based our research basically on what’s publicly available from policies and documents and reports so where the data is being stored is a very good question and I can’t answer that I I I will leave that to better experts what sort of data they’re collecting and and
How much control over that I can go into a little bit more because that’s something they address in their privacy policies basically what sort of information they’re collecting is anything and any everything they possibly can um you know Nissan and Kia mentioned collecting information on your sexual activity um at least four
Companies me mention genetic information I remember at least one company mentioning old factory information which I was like well that’s a new one um you know and then they and then they have these things where they talk about the California civil code with a bunch of garble and if you go read the
Information in that California civil code it’s basically any person information that exists on you so your your financial information your your birth date your location you know your your union status your immigration status you know it just you know like they list the amount of information they
Say they can collect on you in their privacy policies is huge and I get asked a lot oh well how is Nissan collecting information about my sexual activity can they tell when the backseat is rocking and and the answer to that question is I don’t know I don’t know how they’re
Collecting it all I know is that when you purchase a Nissan in order to use their product you have to consent to a privacy policy that when we reviewed it said that they could collect information on your sexual activity and use it for purposes such as direct marketing and
That’s rather shocking to see well and of course Tesla well I don’t know was last year was was somebody exposed the fact that Tesla employees were looking at videos recorded by the Tesla vehicles I don’t know if it was inside or outside the car or both but people being naked
Around their vehicles maybe in garage or something like that and they were you know because they were employees had access to that they were pointing and laughing and sharing these videos people they got in trouble so you know it wouldn’t take much of an AI algorithm to figure out
When sexual activity is happening if you’ve got raw video yeah so you know maybe genetic that’s interesting though and old factory that’s that’s uh as an engineer I’m curious to know how how they’d go about doing that how about it do you know I don’t know if they get
This far in their privacy policy did they declare that the stuff is was encrypted or do they try to help you at least believe that it’s secured you know uh most privacy policies have a mention oh we do our best to secure this but they also a lot
Of them also have the out that you see in privacy policies across the board that says hey anything that’s on the Internet is never 100% secure so you know anything you share with us we can’t guarantee that it will be secure you see that in in most every privacy policy um
And it’s just a good reminder it’s like the companies elves are saying hey you’re we’re going to ask you to share all this data we’re going to collect all this data on you and we can’t guarantee it’s going to be kept safe which is is interesting because the majority of the
Companies we reviewed had had Fairly significant data leaks or privacy breaches over the past few years like none of them were like few of them were completely clean in that regard so when it comes out like where this is stored one of the reasons I was curious whether
Or not it’s it’s stored locally as well as you know sent to the cloud is I’m thinking can my dealership get a hold of this I’m I’m assuming most of this is probably at least the the car sensor data is probably going back to the manufacturer in some way shape or form
Or the or their third parties that handle that subcomponent of the vehicle but I’m thinking about okay what about dealerships if I take my car and to get repaired do they have access to the same data because they can plug in and download it or law enforcement a cop if
I get pulled over or if they impound my car maybe you know can they get access to this data do we do we have any sense for that I’m going to speak to what I’ve heard from other people so this isn’t through my own reach it’s just it’s
Secondhand kind of understanding of how that works my understanding is a lot of data is is can be stored on your car you know you connect your phone to your car some of your phone’s data can be stored there uh a lot of your car usage data
And and location tracking data can be stored on your car my understanding and again this is not through my own research but through you know what I’ve heard is that when you take your car to the dealership they can connect your car and download a lot of information and
That’s a privacy concern it’s also very interesting when you think about you know you buy a new car and your car dealer gives you 3 years of free service and you take your car in and you get it service and they get data off of it
Every time they go there versus when you take your car to you know the local mechanic down the road where they might not be doing that same amount of data collection and have the same sharing agreements within the the car company’s brand of families and so it’s it’s an
Interesting question of is it more private to take my car to the local mechanic where he might not be collecting as much data and sharing that versus to the dealership it’s a question that I I would like to answer more formally than my hypothesis uh but I think it’s a good
One you know I think there are a lot of I you know our our research raised a lot more questions than it answered and and and it’s been really nice to see other people kind of picking up the ball and moving it Forward was they’re looking
Into it as well well and and there’s even other aspects to that I almost like uh uh antitrust and right to repair you know if if my dealership has access to data that would allow them to better service my vehicle and this is kind of going the other way there are good
Reasons to have some of this data if it allowed them to better service my vehicle or do things for my vehicle that a third party couldn’t that would you know certainly be an unfair Advantage it would seem to them and then from a right to repair standpoint I mean uh third
Parties as well that that might or even me right if maybe I don’t have access to that that data and they can it would help me to repair my own vehicle uh so that there it’s really complex there’s a lot of aspects to this issue all right
So what about data collected on cars that I don’t own maybe I’ve got a company car maybe I’ve rented a car maybe I’m a you know a cop or a bus driver or a Amazon driver or UPS driver and and so I’ve got a fleet vehicle and
So maybe I’m I’m sure I’m connecting my phone to that because I want to get calls and things it’s probably got a port for that or I’m just riding someone else’s car it’s like hey I got a cool playlist let me let me plug in and and
So you can hear my cool tunes right what are the implications there is it is it all just the same I mean the car just doesn’t know if you’re the owner or not I assume right yeah one of our favorite findings in our research was the Privacy
Policies that we read and there were more than one that had lines in it that was basically um hey owner driver of your car it’s your job to read this privacy policy and relay this this policy information to anybody who gets in your car because anybody who gets in
Your car has consented to this privacy policy and and we just got such a kick out of that cuz you just imagine you go to pick up your buddy on Saturday afternoon to go catch a movie and before you can leave you’re like okay wait a minute and you rip out the privacy
Policy and you spend you know the next hour reading it to them so they’re clear that the car is collecting data and here’s how and and we don’t know exactly how it’s going to be used but oh by the way you know now that you’re in this car
You’ve consented it to this and and that’s just it’s just so laughable you know I mean you’re like seriously like the moment I step into this car I’ve consented to a privacy policy and it’s the driver Driver’s Responsibility to relay that privacy policy information to me when the driver probably never even
Seen the privacy policy you know it’s this is kind of the when you shake your head at what’s wrong with the world and and lawyers you’re like this is kind of what you point to is like like this isn’t how the world works and so it’s a
Very good question you know you rent a car and then when you rent your car you connect it you know to do the navigation because you’re driving in a in a city you don’t know or something like that and then you disconnect your car and you return it is that data been deleted
Probably not you know there’s a very good chance that it hasn’t you know or you sell your connected car and you forget to disconnect the app and the next person’s driving it around and you can see their location in your app still because you forgot to disconnect the app
You know a lot of people don’t think oh I need to wipe my car clean and do a factory reset when I sell it or return it and so again you know this is just kind of one of privacy not included like biggest gripes since day one is the
Companies put put way too much onus on us the consumer to protect our own privacy from them instead of doing a good job at protecting our our privacy and every car every privacy policy I’ve ever read starts with we hear at ex company really value your privacy and we
Do everything we can to respect it and then you go on to read all this other stuff that indicates otherwise and so yeah there’s just way too much responsibility expected on the consumers right now it’s it’s beyond ridiculous and and there needs to be some serious change yeah notice noticing consent it’s
Just it’s a farce it’s way too easy to to pull one over at us and we’re un inundated with these things we all just click agree that mean we don’t have time to read these things literally don’t have time these things are huge these privacy policies are novels yeah and
Even if you did have time to read them the chances of understanding them are small I mean I like I said me and my team read them for a living and we spend half our day scratching our head messaging each other back and forth go does this make sense to you you know
What’s this mean and it’s all very like legal lawyerly there’s a lot of vague well we may collect information about X Y and Z or you have the right one of my favorites is you have the right to request your data be deleted well I mean everybody has the right to request
Anything right like I can request that like you know Ford give me a million dollars you know I that doesn’t mean they’re going to do it and so to put a line in and says hey you have the right to request your data be deleted and then
They go on and said depending on what jurisdiction you live in that will determine if we actually delete your data and I know you ask about data deletion a little while ago and I never answered that and the answer in the United States is it depends on what
State you live in I live in Vermont after we bought a new car I went online to ask them to Mazda to delete my data and you go into the little form and the very first thing they ask is what state do you live in and when I told them
Vermont they basically laughed me off the internet and said haha we won’t do anything if ID lived in California then there could have been like okay Finish completing this confusing form and we might delete your your data so yeah it’s pretty half-hazard when it comes to data
Deletion well i’ also have to think just from a legal standpoint the the ownership of that data must get really muddy when you’re renting a car or when it’s a fleet vehicle and you don’t own the car but you’re the assigned driver of the vehicle you know maybe you’re
Signing that away as part of your rental contract for example or when you your employee contract when you become a driver that you know any data we collect of the car is ours not yours and you you give up your rights to it it’s it’s so
Muddy it’s just yeah okay so yeah we like to say you know if the if the product is than you are probably the product but cars are really expensive We There are unfortunate times when this like our cell phones too right we pay a lot of money for our cell phones and
They’re still monetizing our data are car companies being upfront about this like are they telling you when you’re buying a vehicle now that they’re doing this are the are dealers required to not only force you to sub apparently install the app but are they at least required
To give you some sort of a heads up that they’re doing this kind of thing are the are the is there enough transparency the short answer is no like I said we just bought a car last year at no point was a privacy policy a privacy documentation information sharing kind of ever
Presented or discussed as part of that buying process you know like I said some cars will you know you’ll start it up and you’ll get into the connected service and there’ll be a quick screen and I’ve heard people describe them as really cck quick and they act you know
And you actually like hit a button to try and sort it out you know with a new car you’re like how does this work and you hit buttons and things disappear and then they never come back back and you’re like I don’t know what I just
Agreed to and at this point I don’t even know where to go to find out so no the the process to inform consumers and be transparent with consumers about this is is non-existent at at worst or very very very weak and lame at best but if you talk to the car manufacturers they’ll
Swear up and down that they’re transparent and and they’re open and they give people all kinds of opportunities for choice and I don’t know if they’re out of touch or evil but that’s not actually what’s happening I think I don’t think that’s most consumers experience with it and so yeah
No there’s no there’s nowhere near the level of transparency choice and consent that needs to exist right now we focus a lot about privacy and I think I think that’s enough I I don’t think we necessarily have to go further than that but if for some reason if that’s not
Compelling enough let’s let’s think about like security because there’s be Beyond just this creepy factor of behind the scenes or monetizing me and oh that’s funny I I went to the this area of town the other day and now I’m seeing you know ads for the story that’s right
Over there huh is that a coincidence probably not but anyway besides just you know the creepy privacy stuff there’s there’s real security aspects to this kind of data being collected I mean one of the things you mentioned was uh and I saw the article too from cashmir Hill
About spouses who or or ex lovers or or significant others whatever somebody you were with you’re shared a car together you’re with some time together and they’ve maybe now have access through the car app or something to to track you or to get some of this data
To find out oh maybe she’s cheating on me where’s that where’s the new place she’s been spending the night or things like that there are security issues around this too do you know of any other like either theoretically or true actual anecdotes where this has become an issue
Well it was interesting when we were doing our research you know we would read as much about the cars and apps and stuff as we could and you’d go to like some of the app pages and they would tout features like our valet parking features and and that would include
Things like location tracking a Geo fencing so you could set up a Geo fenced area and you would get a notification anytime your car left that Geo fenced area or teen driving um protections features which include being able to set limits on speed or how loud the radio
Can be or or you know convenience features like a digital key that you can give to somebody to use temporarily and then revoke at any time and as we were reading about these you know they all sound oh valet parking feature that lets me track things and not get a
Notification when a car leaves an area or digital keys that I can revoke at any time and you know I’m a jaded person and I all I could think of was how these could be Abus such used by abusers in horrible horrible ways but that there
Was never any mention on any of the car car manufacturers literature about hey these features are designed to be useful for Valley parking or your teen driver but we recognize that abuse these could be be abused in abusive situations and so if that’s the case here are some
Measures we’ve taken to help prevent that I never saw that and you you know if you anybody that’s heard of air tags no air tags came out from Apple the little tracking Bluetooth things and not long after people are like oh these could be used by stalkers we need anti-
Stocking features and apple said oh yeah we better get on that and they did um and it’s gotten a little better and I feel like with the cars it’s like again it goes back to was there just nobody in the the RO when they were building these
Things like was there like literally no woman in the room that said um hey this could be really abusive if somebody got a hold of this like or did some woman in the room raise her hand and they just ignored her or did or did they just not
Think I just don’t know how you could build these features for location tracking Geo fencing remote Keys um limiting area limiting speed and not think how they could be abused and then not have any way to like acknowledge that this could be abused and say Here’s how to contact us if you’re having
Issues or here’s a way to disable things or just anything to kind of mitigate that and and again I don’t know again is it car companies are stupid or they evil I can’t tell but it’s really frightening to me that that there’s women out there that have been stalked by their abusers
By their cars and haven’t been able to get the companies to do anything about it well as somebody who attended attends Defcon every year now and going to their car hacking Village what this means to me is these cars are now on the internet all the time at least while they’re on I
Guess but like with my EV right now is technically off but it’s on it’s got a battery in it I mean I could communicate with it right now if I wanted to by whipping out my app so it’s on uh which means it’s connected to the internet uh
And it’s not just Wi-Fi it’s not like it’s just when it’s in my garage it’s got a Cellular Connection it’s connected anywhere there cell towers which is everywhere and there have been cases like the the classic one was the Jeep one where the guys were able to hit the
Brakes on a Jeep remotely uh and there’s been other on recently too where there’s been remote hacking on these cars it could be a security Nightmare and of course and then from there’s Espionage capabilities you know what if I could track the car that I know that President
Biden Secret Service detail uses or you know I’m sure that I would hope that the the Beast is a little more locked down than that but certainly there’s got to be you know there’s got to be Espionage and other even if you trust your own government with this information you
Might not trust foreign governments do you have any comments on that do you have any thoughts about that yeah I mean there there were some articles that we came across about how ice had very cozy relationships with some of the car manufacturers to share data to track people that they had deemed illegal
Immigrants you know you think about our abortion laws in the country now and and how that could really be used against women seeking reproductive health care and you mentioned you know government government is a big entity there’s local government there’s state government there’s federal government there’s foreign government and any of these
Getting access either legally or illegally to listen in to look in to take control of your car it all gets really scary really fast especially when you think of we’re Americans our cars mean something to us they mean Independence and freedom and you know they’re where we have our first kiss or
The Hanky Panky in the backseat or we sing too loud or we have a a sensitive conversation with our kids you know like people think of them to too I mean to this day I hope that I think they still think of them as a private space an
Extension of their home and the fact that they are so no longer private to the degree that they are and people aren’t really aware of it because we don’t buy cars every year or every couple years like we do a phone or a computer or something like that you know
Um we buy cars every five years or 10 years and privacy can’t be the first thing we think about you know you have to think about what you can afford and what’s safe and what features fit your needs and what’s available to you and only after all that maybe privacy might
Be a consideration but after you’ve bought the car it’s too late to do anything and even if was anything you can do which there’s really not and so it’s just it we’ve gotten to the point where we’re just in a really bad situation and there’s not a
Lot consumers can do and it’s up to the policy makers and The Regulators to step up and and push these car companies to be better because there’s just at this point we’re kind of helpless and and that stinks um as a privacy researcher who advocates for consumers it makes me
Really really angry when consumers don’t have any choice as well it should so what kind of response did you get from this article from the manufacturers did you know I know you tried to reach out them beforehand but once the article came out did that maybe did that wake them up a
Little bit more for some of the ones that were less responsive and I really what I’m curious is did this trigger any response from legislators either in the US or or abroad uh the car companies continue to ignore us they mostly ignored us when we were doing our
Research and reached out to them we heard from a couple mostly one told us to stop spamming them with their questions another one answered a couple of our questions but not very well um and then after the it came out we didn’t hear from them at all they basically
Ignored us we heard through some journalists some responses of things like Kia who got called out because they say they could collect information about your sex life and their privacy policy and Kia’s response to the journalist we talked to was oh we’re not doing that
And I’m like okay I guess we just have to take your word for it um so not a lot of response you know you hear through the Great Vine oh the car company companies are really up in arms about this they this has got them really
Worried you know you hear about that but we didn’t hear from them directly in terms of the the response from policy makers and Regulators that was that has been encouraging I mean we we’ve talked to some staffers that work from the house Energy and Commerce Committee
About what we found and and what might be some short-term things that could be done um Senator Ed Mary’s office sent a letter to the 15 car companies asking some of the questions to the car companies to answer some the questions that we couldn’t get answers to at least
Four European members of parliament have submitted questions for car companies to answer um trying to get answers and and and doing their own work over there and so it’s been nice to see that at least some some of the elected officials and and regulators and policy makers we
Talked to the folks from the GAO the government accountability office which was very exciting for me I’m a big fan of the GAO and so it’s it’s nice to see that that’s happening maybe a little late maybe a lot late but it’s happening and it’s nice to see that it’s happening
Both in the United States and in Europe um because those are the big markets and hopefully you know anything that can be pushed here or there can be trickle out to smaller markets too and so that’s encouraging um but those Wheels grind really slowly and nothing might happen
In the next year or two while this continues to get worse which is a little disheartening but I think if we if we keep pressure on you know know keep calling your elected officials um it’s an election year vote for the people that support strong privacy regulations
Ask them those questions when before you go to The Ballot Box um consider that do you have any sense and I I know you’re you’re not a lawyer but do you have do you have any sense for the the laws that are on the books now are the ones that
Have been proposed for privacy California is obviously leading the way as they often do in this in this Arena but there have been several privacy bills that have at least poked their head up and at the federal level and they haven’t unfortunately been passed but do you know if they’re kind of phrased
In a way that they would include cars should they become law like does CCPA and CPR in California do they do they govern cars or is was that something that’s kind of a loophole because it’s it’s not really considered um most of the car companies privacy policies you
Read did have a CCPA a the California Privacy Law section it was actually if you’re ever if you’re ever interested in reading a privacy policy because you have way too much time on your hands um just skip to the California privacy policy section if if a privacy policy
Has one because it’s going to it tends to be a lot more detailed because California law requires that they disclose you know what the information is collected for and how it’s used and if it’s being sold under the the definition of sold of California um and
So CCPA does govern this but uh it only goes so far you know Californians have the right to know more or have the right to know if their data is being sold and they have the right to have it be deleted but it doesn’t put any limits on
The rights of what can be collected and how it can be used necessarily and so that’s kind of where the problems come in is just car companies collecting as much data as they possibly can and then saying oh we’re going to use this for legitimate business purposes and and so
Much can be considered a legitimate business purpose so I I’m no policy expert so all I can’t go into the details of all the state Privacy Law LA and what covers what um and like you said there have been some proposed Federal privacy laws but nothing that’s
Actually really kind of got a lot of momentum behind it right now uh hopefully that will change soon um so we’re still a long way away uh and and privacy protections aren’t very good across the country even where they are good they still aren’t nearly enough all right so a couple questions
Before you go first of all so what can we do it sounds like what you’re basically saying is not a whole lot like there’s no there’s not a really good way to opt out you can’t really avoid it with new cars so I guess is there like a
Year when this really started like if I wanted if I’m just adamant like you know what I’m going to get an old car so I don’t have to deal with this how old would that car have to be for me not to have to deal with this and then as a
Consumer and as a citizen what do you I mean what do you recommend you already mentioned you know writing your representatives anything else that we can do along these lines to help uh for have a better future when as far as this is concerned yeah uh so when did it start
Is a very good question um I know the first recall you mentioned this Jeep had a security hack I believe it was in 2016 and that was the first year that an official recall was issued on a car um for cyber security reasons and so if you
Want to go back and buy a car that kind of falls out of this um modern Car Technology you’ve got to go back probably more than 10 years to be safe I drive a 2022 Toyota Tundra and it’s wonderful and I hope it lasts forever cuz it’s not collecting very much on me
Um it doesn’t have any apps and I love it um but unfortunately I’m really hesitant to tell people to do that because most of us don’t have the resources and knowledge to afford to up keep and maintain an old car it’s just not a realistic expectation and and so
Then you’re like okay so I have to get a newer car you know make sure the person if you’re buying used make sure the person behind that had it before delet to their app and reset the you know factory reset it and you know okay so I’m not going to download install the
App that’s one thing I’ve done but is that really you know I’m still you know going to connect my you know carplay so I can see the map on the car and I’m still got sensors and cameras and that’s collecting data and sharing it back and
Can I disable that I’ve had a lot of people emailing asking can I just disable this and maybe if you’re super technical you could go in and find a way to disable it but then you R run the risk of invalidating your warranty or making your car unsafe um if your car
Can’t get safety updates or or you know basically can’t update its software it could become unsafe um and that’s an issue and so I I would be very hesitant to recommend people to fool around with that sort of stuff so really it does come down at the end of the day that
Unfortunately consumers don’t have good options you know I live in a rural area so riding my bike everywhere isn’t an option uh and and again it comes back to it’s time for the people with power to do to do more it’s time for I mean I
Would love to see the car companies do what’s right but my faith in that is low so it comes down to us pushing the policy makers and The Regulators to really do something and do something with a strong consumer Focus you know don’t let the car companies in to write
Their own privacy laws don’t let them self-regulate like we need something that’s better I mean cuz now the stories are coming out that you know car companies are now um coming with chat GPT um Mercedes comes with Tik Tok installed uh you know you’re you’re getting even more data collection
Mechanisms built in your car not less and so yeah I I hate to be such a doom and gloom Debbie Downer I really do but I just I I at this point I don’t know what to tell people that could actually be useful um little things like
Don’t install the app um request your data be deleted and see what happens but those are drips in a pond and not nearly enough well I’m so glad you’re doing what you’re doing I I I I have a best and worst gift guide that I put out every Thanksgiving and I reference you
Guys all the time uh and I so I refer you guys to the privac St include all time it’s great stuff there and and this particular report is just Earth shattering so what’s what’s next for you guys tell me what’s coming up do you guys have any more broad product
Categories you’re looking at like I don’t know medical devices or things like that or anything else that you want to focus on in your next big expose yeah well our our very next thing is Valentine’s Day and so in the past we’ve reviewed dating apps and sex toys um and
That’s been some of our like most popular content shockingly um a couple of the sex toys have of year after year been some of our top searched uh products so um and dating apps um are very popular when it comes to privacy so we’re refreshing some of our reviews on
Dating apps but this year we’re adding um reviews of AI girlfriend chap Bots or romantic chats that’s a thing yeah that’s a growing thing that that um exists in our world now these relationship chat relationship chat bots so we’re looking at those now in advance of Valentine’s Day and that’s that’s
Kind of I mean that’s not probably going to be on the expose level of cars but it is interesting and it is something that people seem to care about um but we are going to spend some time later this year digging more deeply into the ai ai kind
Of exploded last year you probably never heard of chat GPT now you’ve heard of it way too much um open Ai and barred and and and everything and AI is everywhere now and what does that actually mean for me as a consumer um our hope is to spend
Some time this year and dig into that and try and actually understand what that means and and one example that I can give that we’ve seen already there’s a lot of concern about you know you download uh AI relationship chatbot it’s designed for you to talk to and and
Share very sensitive information that’s what it’s designed for and so you go into that with an expectation uh that that’s what you’re going to use it for if you agree to the privacy policy when you download it and unstall the app so basically download the app and click
Agree like you probably will do you’ve consented for that company to use the contents of your sensitive personal chats to train their AIS and is that okay should there be a higher bar for consent for your sensitive personal information and the contents of those chats to be used to
Change train their AI should you have to give more explicit consent for that I feel that you should I feel that just simply agreeing to the privacy policy when you download the app isn’t isn’t the high enough bar to say okay now use everything I tell this my RO my AI
Girlfriend to train your AIS I think the bar should be higher and so that’s one thing that we’ve already kind of started to notice but AIS are very interesting when it comes to privacy because um they’re designed to collect a lot more information you know Bru schne wrote an
Excellent article for slate talking about how the internet as we’ve not it has a enabled Mass surveillance and AI is going to enable mass spying and and he goes on and outlines the difference and and it’s a really great way to frame how we think about this our new AI world
Is supercharging our privacy concerns you know I’ve been talking about this for six or seven years now and people some people listen but nothing people are like I care about privacy but I don’t know what to do so I just go about my life um with ai ai designed to
Collect tons of more personal information they’re designed for us to have personal conversations to be our friends to share a lot and the Privacy policies that we’re seeing just aren’t sufficient to cover and handle that from a consumer perspective so we’re hoping to get like elbows deep into what that
Looks like and what that means for consumers and see what we can find out and see what we can do to try and push for good and by the way if if you have not if you’re not buying into this watch the movie Her with Wen Phoenix and then
You’ll think you’ll have a much better understanding what she’s talking about so uh Jen this was fantastic we’ll definitely have to have you back in the future this was very informative thank you so much for coming on the show yeah thanks for having me thanks again Jen for coming on the
Show that was great that was a very very interesting interview uh I’ve got links in the show notes to their privacy not included report on car privacy you should definitely check that out uh also she mentioned a Valentine’s Day article uh they did publish one it uh didn’t
Cover all the things that she said it might cover this one only covers the AI relationship chat Bots but that is still a very interesting read and there’s a link to that in the show notes as well hopefully they’ll be doing the ones on dating apps and uh smart sex toys at
Some point I will definitely want to read those and when I hear that those are out I will pass those along she also mentioned the bru schne article in slate magazine I found that and put a link in the show notes to that as well so I mean
If we’ve learned nothing else modern cars are really becoming computers on Wheels there’s even an industry term for this now they’re calling it it’s weird it’s called softwar defined vehicle or sdv but basically what they’re saying is that cars you know are now connected to the internet and have an operating
System and installed applications regular software updates they’re kind of computers now and because they’re like computers they have the same kind of vulnerabilities and uh software bugs that you’re going to expect to have in computers um and because they’re on the internet all the time now they really
Need to be protected like a computer who’s on the the internet we might get to the point where cars have built in anti virus software or at least some of these antimalware protections that are you know becoming built into like Windows and Mac OS or maybe we should
Think of it more like iOS or Android maybe it’s more along those lines nevertheless that’s where we are today and because our cars have gazillions of sensors in them and they’re connected to the internet they are collecting ridiculous amounts of information and currently there’s nothing preventing them from monetizing that data and
Sharing it with other people so we’ve got to get that figured out and so I’m really glad that Mozilla has published this report because we need more exposure on this on Thursday’s bonus podcast for the patrons uh of course I’ve got some bonus Q&A with Jen we talk about privacy not included
Origin story we talk about mozfest which I hadn’t heard of it’s mozilla’s Tech Festival um I hadn’t heard of that but apparently it’s been going on for 15 years and we talk about my concern about cellular modems and iot devices and we even talk about like some favorite
Privacy theme or oriented TV shows and movies so anyway just some fun extra questions for the patrons and that as usual will be coming out on Thursday so we need to support groups like Mozilla if you like the kind of reporting that you heard today about privacy and cars
You should check out their privacy not included guide there’s a lot of great reviews there on other products they didn’t start with cars as Jen was telling us they started with other things if you like the Firefox browser uh if you like the tour browser if you like the mulvad browser there are
Several browsers out there that are based on Firefox we definitely need browser diversity right now it’s basically Firefox Safari and chrome pretty much have the entire Market unfortunately Chrome has most of it so anyway we need to support groups like Mozilla for for lots of reasons uh so if
You’re interested I strong strongly recommend that you throw these guys a little appreciation go to their donate. mozilla.org website uh you can do a onetime thing you can do an ongoing thing like I do I actually donate uh I think 10 bucks a month but another way
To support them is just to use Firefox and get other people to use Firefox we need to pry people away from from using Chrome it’s like I don’t know 60% of the entire population of the planet uses Chrome or something like that so anyway they are doing some really great stuff
And I would like to see them continue to do those things and if you would do then uh find some way to help support Mozilla so one more thing really quick before we go I have finally gone through all of your feedback from the annual listener survey thank you again to everybody who
Responded there’s some really good stuff in there there I was very happy to see honestly that the vast majority of you really like what I’m doing and don’t want me to change a whole lot uh but there are some ideas in there that I will definitely be considering uh some
That I will definitely be doing one of which by the way was pretty easy and I can’t believe I hadn’t done it already my URL shortening service that I host and created myself the fdsd domme website that I use to shorten Earls like FD sd. me/ merch or SL degoogle for my
Degoogle your life series or SL dprc for my data privacy checklist I’ve got several of these things and I use my own URL shortener for this but if you go to Just fdsd domme and don’t put anything after the slash if you just go to there
It fails like it gives an ugly error message and so I put a final I put a very simple page I’ll try to make it prettier later but I finally did put a very simple page there I Could Have Had It redirect to my main website but I’ve
Actually got kind of two of them right I’ve got one for the podcast I’ve got one for the blog those are technically two different websites so I I think what I’m going to do is make that just a jumping page for uh how to get to those
Two main websites and maybe some other stuff too so anyway right now if you go to fdsd me it actually has something there and that was a suggestion that somebody put in the annual listener survey so again glad I did it thank you for saying that uh and I’m already
Working on some of your suggestions many of you also recommended people that I could interview I’ve already reached out actually to several of those people still waiting to hear back on some of them one of them at least has been locked in uh may be a couple months
Before it happens but uh again this is this is why I do the annual survey this is why it’s great for you to give me that feedback I absolutely do take it to heart and try to act on it where I can and honestly I’d actually take feedback
At any time so if you want to send an email to feedback at firewalls don’tstop dragon.com I’ll take that at any time but every January I do the survey which gives me a chance to get some demographic information and some other things from you and by the way the I did
Pick the 10 winners uh 10 random people who responded They will receive a physical copy of my book I’m working with my publisher on on that right now please be patient it may take a few weeks for that to come through but it will happen so that will do it for this
Week everybody thanks for tuning in as usual until next week as always stay safe out there and don’t get caught with your draw bridge down
2 Comments
When it comes to privacy nightmares in cars, automotive insurance companies are waaaay ahead of the curve. Easily by a decade or two.
CNN is state run propaganda