Automobile Surveillance: When Black Boxes In Cars Become The Norm
Security expert Bruce Schneier, in a blog item about the New York Times Tesla review brouhaha, takes note of the data collection:
Read the article to see what they logged: power consumption, speed, ambient temperature, control settings, location, and so on.The stakes are high here. Broder and the New York Times are concerned about their journalistic integrity, which affects their brand. And Tesla Motors wants to sell cars.
The implication is that Tesla Motors only does this for media test drives, but it gives you an idea of the sort of things that will be collected once automobile black boxes become the norm. We're used to airplane black boxes, which only collected a small amount of data from the minutes just before an incident. But that was back when data was expensive. Now that it's cheap, expect black boxes to collect everything all the time. And once it's collected, it'll be used. By auto manufacturers, by insurance companies, by car rental companies, by marketers. The list will be long.
But as we're learning from this particular back-and-forth between Broder and Tesla Motors, even intense electronic surveillance of the actions of a person in an enclosed space did not succeed in providing an unambiguous record of what happened. To know that, the car company would have had to have someone in the car with the journalist.
This will increasingly be a problem as we are judged by our data. And in most cases, neither side will spend this sort of effort trying to figure out what really happened.
Commenter "Winter" at Schneier's site notes:
"We have already seen that prosecutors have been known to withhold from trial, information that might prevent a defendant from being found guilty."We already see what happens then in Russia.
Everybody in Russia drives around with a dashcam to use the recordings as evidence against police, state prosecution, and insurance companies.
So, if they collect data, about us, we can collect even more data about ourselves to defend ourselves.
Whether this is actually a "Good Thing" (tm) is a different matter.
My insurance company gives me a discount for driving fewer than 2,500 miles a year. (I have a 2004 Honda Insight hybrid with about 21,000 miles on it.) Right now, I just mail them an account of my mileage. How long before they use the cookie of cheaper insurance to convince people to stick some sort of device in their car? (And this may not be possible in a cost-effective way in older cars -- but who wants to bet on how long it will take insurance company lobbyists to get Washington sleaze-o-crats to make this a reality in every new car?)
Oh, they're already doing it, Amy. Progressive has one you can install for "discounts" and I think a few others do too. I'd rather pay more for my insurance, thanks.
momof4 at February 18, 2013 6:44 AM
Most cars already have 30-second-snapshot black boxes, right? So if you crash and tell the insurance company you were only doing 30 when you were actually doing 80, you'll get busted. And you'll deserve to.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 18, 2013 7:10 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2013/02/18/automobile_surv.html#comment-3611512">comment from momof4It's fine if you freely agree to it, momof4 -- the government mandating it is the next step.
Amy Alkon
at February 18, 2013 8:22 AM
Any car that was manufactured after 1996 has the OBD-II built in. It has about 8-10 hours (guesstimate) of storage built in. But it is volatile. If the battery is disconnected or drops below five volts, the data is gone.
The modules Progressive uses are probably in the 64GB range. You can also buy your own scanners, and cables to connect to a laptop.
If California has smog testing, this is how they do it. Get it from your cars OBD-II system.
Jim P. at February 18, 2013 10:47 AM
I'm much more concerned re: the Gov. using the data. Any state or local gov. is going to be very tempted to use this as a revenue generator. Think of it. Gov. mandates that your car has a black box which records speed and location. Doing 35 (or, hell, 32) in a 30 zone? The black box calls home, tells authorities and a few days later a ticket shows up in the mail. And you can't fight it, you're car's already ratted you out and will testify against you.
Kevin at February 18, 2013 11:38 AM
The way I would handle that would be the same way way I would handle my kid needing to carry an RFID in school.
Tag meet Mr. Microwave. Black box meet Mr. Microwave.
When the school want to fine me for child's non-attendance it would be prove he wasn't there? Then the school would have to prove a negative, because I want the video tapes.
If the state tries to fine me for not having a reporting black box I take it to trial. The requirement would be an invasion of privacy, self incrimination and right to travel. The invasion of privacy is essentially a fifth amendment right against self-incrimination. The right to travel and privacy are not specifically listed in the Constitution, but have been found in several SCOTUS rulings. Effectively the first person charged will be able to challenge the law.
You can clear your OBD-II with a laptop, a special cable and a few seconds.
For that matter, you can buy a radar gun for about a $100. You can also buy a radar detector for about a $100. With a little tech skill you can mesh the two to effectively make a radar jammer. Of course I would never advocate anything illegal.
Jim P. at February 18, 2013 7:23 PM
Just an aside, but the flight data recorders on modern airliners actually record quite a bit of data. There are maintenance recorders onboard that record additional data, plus there's a system called ACARS which downlinks certain data while in flight. (ACARS data was critical to the Air France 447 investigation.)
The cockpit voice recorders are still limited to 30 minutes, although the technology to hold quite a bit more is available. There's a tension there between crew privacy and the FAA's desire to preserve the data. Sometimes, in non-crash incident cases, the crew forgets to shut off the voice recorder after landing, and the relevant audio from the flight gets recorded over after landing as the aircraft sits at the gate. And the recorder doesn't just pick up crew dialogue; it detects everything that's audible in the cockpit. You'd be surprised how often a background noise that is picked up by the cockpit voice recorder helps an investigation.
Cousin Dave at February 19, 2013 7:14 AM
I find it amazing that Americans can watch the Progressive ad, where Flo takes over every television and monitor in America to promote their black box, and not shiver at the idea.
Hey, if it's Flo, it has to be OK, right?
Even a wonderful idea, right?
Radwaste at February 21, 2013 2:56 AM
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