
Your Car Knows When You Gain Weight - tysone
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/20/opinion/car-repair-data-privacy.html
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srfilipek
This is all FUD with zero data backing it up.

The article makes it sound like there is accurate weight sensors in the
vehicle, which is ridiculous. One might be able to derive _some_ number from
vehicle performance information, but I'd like to see an actual study showing
that it's (a) possible and (b) accurate for any sort of use.

> Modern cars collect as much as 25 gigabytes of data per hour

Sure, add up all the bits in the CAN messages being sent around constantly and
you might get that number. That amount of data is neither being stored nor
sent off-vehicle.

What a dishonest article.

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acranox
Cars do have accurate weight sensors actually. I’m a former Honda Master
Technician. The drivers seat on Honda’s from probably mid 2000 onward have a
weight sensor. It’s used to determine the deployment for the multi stage
airbags. I hooked up our diagnostic equipment and sat in the seat once to see
how accurate it was. And it’s very accurate. However most people sit with
their feet on the floor, so it doesn’t show the proper weight. But lift your
feet up, and it was accurate to within a pound of my actual weight.

However, this is FUD, because Honda didn’t do squat with that data beyond the
airbag system. It wasn’t collected or transmitted. It was simply used at the
moment of airbag deployment to determine if it should deploy the airbag in
fast or slow mode.

So you’re right to call the articles claim BS, but you’re wrong if you think
there isn’t an accurate weight sensor in the car.

I can’t remember if the passenger seat had one too. I don’t think it did. The
dual-stage airbags are really only relevant for the driver side because of the
steering wheel.

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srfilipek
> it was accurate to within a pound of my actual weight

That is extremely surprising to me. I've worked (and do work) in the auto
industry and didn't think that anyone would pay for such an accurate weight
measurement.

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londons_explore
What's up with this paywall?

It loads so slowly you can get half way through the article before it finally
loads and then decides you need to subscribe!

