
Ford Exec: 'We Know Everyone Who Breaks the Law' Thanks To Our GPS In Your Car - ozh
http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-exec-gps-2014-1
======
rickdale
I just bought a ford taurus. It immediately connects my cell phone to my car
and I sorta get the feeling like the cops that sit on the eway have access to
the computer in my car and also the cell phone connected to that computer. But
hey thats just my paranoia.

On another note, it was very clear checking off do not track in the vehicle.
The only reason they say they want to track is for data like the exec gives
the example for, traffic analysis etc. not like daily tracking. But it is
creepy and really I dont know if all the benefits balance out the potential
drawbacks.

There is also this notification in the myfordsync system that is "911
Assist".. now this is a fine option, but literally the car will remind you
everytime you start it that it is off and unless you select otherwise, it
won't just alert you, but will give you the option to turn it on.

~~~
deveac
_> On another note, it was very clear checking off do not track in the
vehicle._

I cannot see it remaining this way. It is just a matter of time before the
OEMs buckle and sell your data to an enterprising third party in exchange for
the ability to lower costs. The auto supply chain is notorious for being a
bloodbath of cost-cutting. It's a perfect cultural fit.

Not saying that you won't retain the option to turn off tracking as these
systems become more widespread, but it's just an illegible TOS away from being
opt-in by default with a buried opt-out.

~~~
joelrunyon
> It is just a matter of time before the OEMs buckle and sell your data to an
> enterprising third party in exchange for the ability to lower costs.

Is anyone else getting sick of this trend? Especially with stuff that you pay
full-price for. I can understand why gmail / facebook / etc do it - but for
other traditional models to jump in on it seems like they're all too eager to
destroy any traditional transactions.

~~~
ganeumann
I agree, but I also understand why it happens. For a lot of people the only
thing better then paying what something is worth is paying nothing for
something of worth. That you paid a value for a product doesn't mean you don't
want to pay less money for that purchase.

Everybody complains about airlines cutting legroom, but no one seems willing
to stop buying the airline ticket that comes to the top when you click 'sort
by price, lowest to highest.

People say they value things--privacy, comfort, freedom, health, etc.--one
way, then they act in a way that shows they value money more. It's enough to
make you stop believing what people tell you and instead just looking at what
they do.

Or maybe I'm just old and cynical.

~~~
robterrell
It's possible you're just cynical... I think many people would do more than
simply complain. If the travel aggregators listed legroom as a descriptor, you
can absolutely bet I would be comparing it along with price, durations, and
stops.

If my auto manufacturer made it clear that there was a hidden GPS in my car
constantly reporting my position (hilarious that, for a GPS that _I_ can see,
I have to pay a ridiculous extra amount for the "option") I would definitely
ask them how to turn it off.

~~~
mikeash
You supposedly value legroom, but you're not willing to spend the two minutes
it takes to do the research yourself? I don't think you actually value
legroom.

In case you just thought it was much harder to discover than it actually is,
check out seatguru.com.

~~~
malyk
You might be able to research leg-room when you buy a ticket, but there is no
way to guarantee you get the same plane or same seating configuration when you
show up at the airport.

Over New Years my wife and I flew United from IAD to SFO. Checked in the night
before the flight and was assigned row 38 seats E and F. Got to the airport
the next morning and our seats were separate because the plane that actually
showed up to fly us only had 37 rows.

If an airline can't even assign the correct seats the night before a flight
there is no way they can do that months in advance when you are buying the
ticket.

~~~
mikeash
There's no guarantee, but the odds are very good just the same. Based on my
experience, you have probably a 95% chance of getting the airplane they say
you'll get.

And of course you can enhance this by explicitly paying for more room. Lots of
airlines these days are offering coach-class seating with more room. United
has Economy Plus, and most other airlines let you pay a small premium for exit
row seating, bulkhead seating, or similar.

If you don't want to pay extra and you don't want to do the research that
gives you a good chance of getting what you want, well, that's absolutely
fine, but I'm not going to believe that you care at all about legroom if you
do.

------
barrkel
Ford VP Jim Farley: _we don 't supply that data to anyone_

The only thing that remains to be seen is how long that stays true. Once the
data exists, it's much easier for the state to appropriate it. It's far harder
for the state to mandate collection of this data to begin with. Ford has
already done the hard bit.

The UK's CleanFeed was similarly coopted in order to implement censorship of
PirateBay. It's unlikely the courts could have forced ISPs to implement a
censorship scheme. But the ISPs created one anyway, with the noble goal of
reducing child porn commerce; and of course, it was only to be used for this
purpose. But once the courts found out about the capability, they could force
it to be used in much more ambiguous and less noble situations.

~~~
ctdonath
I want that changed to _we don 't COLLECT that data, much less supply it to
anyone_.

Don't think I'll be buying a Ford until then, and will check for other
manufacturers pulling the same intrusive stunt.

------
jrockway
I think perfect enforcement of laws would be great. Because traffic tickets
are so random, nobody really changes their behavior to avoid them, and it
becomes more of a reverse lottery than anything else. Meanwhile, children on
their way to school also lose the reverse lottery, but instead of a $300 fine,
they die.

Perfect enforcement also puts pressure on lawmakers to make reasonable laws.
If it's just some guy that you don't relate to being burned by stupid laws,
you're not going to care. If it's everyone, you are going to care.

~~~
Sambdala
Edit: op added his second paragraph after I, and several others, replied.
While the second paragraph is more reasonable on it's own, I still highly
disagree with the implied reasoning of the first paragraph.

I disagree vehemently.

People drive a speed they feel comfortable driving. Full Stop.

The only time a speed limit sign changes behavior in the vast majority of
drivers (in the US anyway) is when a cop is present.

The smarter way to reduce speed in the sections of road that actually are more
dangerous is to make them look more dangerous, for example by painting lines
on the road that make you think you're travelling faster than you are.

There are major roads where, except for rush hour, 100% of cars on the road
are travelling well above the speed limit because it is set far too low for a
modern vehicle driving on a multi-lane, fairly straight highway.

This causes a fairly similar attitude toward speed limits that a large
percentage of the population has toward pot: you scaremonger about something
that obviously isn't dangerous in 95% of cases (pot / 35 MPH, 6 lane roads),
which makes the remaining 5% of cases that are actually dangerous (Heroin /
sharp turn with low visibility) seem less dangerous because you spent so much
effort to conflate the two.

Meanwhile, we're unable to have a sober conversation about the subject that
results in speed limits and road laws that make sense because of _think of the
children!_ scaremongering, e.g., "children on their way to school also lose
the reverse lottery, but instead of a $300 fine, they die."

~~~
Shinkei
The flaw in your argument is, "I trust myself driving, but I don't trust
anyone else."

I am a great driver and people had been present when I got myself out of
'sticky' situations--avoided red-light runner t-bones, people merging into me,
parking lot fender benders who don't check their rear, etc.

Problem is, there are plenty of bad drivers out there who would happily go
80-90 and drive recklessly in their parents' BMW (Palm Beach teenagers,
anyone?). The deaths due to traffic accidents are staggering and it's a huge
public health issue. If speeding is not illegal, then it could be difficult to
show wrecklessness or other mitigating circumstances should there be a
manslaughter case. IMNAL, but I think it could have wider and unexpected
implications.

I agree that many speed limits are somewhat arbitrary, but I disagree with
'smart' means of reducing people's speed. People need to learn how to follow
the rules or they don't belong in society... it's as simple as that.

~~~
Sambdala
The flaw in my argument is that I'm calling for reasonable and evidence based
traffic laws and road planning, rather than making it a political fiasco
that's more about revenue generation than safety?

Whereas your argument is, the status quo is fine, people just need to follow
the current rules better, even though all evidence says people aren't going to
do so?

~~~
Shinkei
I agree with the revenue generation/political issue... I think those unfairly
influence traffic safety laws.

I think there are certainly some areas where speed limits should be much
higher, but my point is that you need to balance your desire to drive faster
with the risks of people who are not as responible as you causing major
accidents.

------
belluchan
Your car isn't the only person who knows where you are. Your cellular phone
service, your smartphone manufacturer, all the apps that have GPS access,
license plate scanners, people who upload pictures with your face in it with
GPS coordinates. This is the inevitable future in developed countries. It's
probably going to be a long time before this saturation reaches under-
developed countries so you can probably make a nice life for yourself there if
you really hate this.

------
ck2
Does that mean they know the cop who wrote you the ticket and the judge who
found you guilty, both went faster than the speed limit that morning when you
all appeared in court?

This is kind of like how the NSA knows about every crooked cop in America
based on financial and voice/data traffic but decides not to tell anyone
because it might upset people they know this.

------
downandout
This quote was taken out of context and generalized, I assume purposely, to
unjustly raise the alarm level. According to the Business Insider article, he
was specifically referring to speeding violations.

From [http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-exec-
gps-2014-1](http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-exec-gps-2014-1):

 _" Because of the GPS units installed in Ford vehicles, Ford knows when many
of its drivers are speeding, and where they are while they're doing it._" He
also said _" I absolutely left the wrong impression about how Ford operates.
We do not track our customers in their cars without their approval or
consent."_

The iPhone in your pocket can do much more damage to you in terms of
incriminating evidence than Ford can.

~~~
kbutler
You are quoting the article, but the headline is from his quoted statement a
paragraph later (later retracted saying it was hypothetical):

"We know everyone who breaks the law, we know when you're doing it. We have
GPS in your car, so we know what you're doing. By the way, we don't supply
that data to anyone," he told attendees. [http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-
exec-gps-2014-1](http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-exec-gps-2014-1)

------
darkxanthos
It's not that there's GPS in my car and me breaking the law is knowable that
concerns me... it's that this exec implies that the data is being uploaded
without my consent.

~~~
codereflection
My thoughts exactly.

------
occam65
I get the sinking feeling that this trend is gaining momentum, rather than
reversing course. If the trend continues, government standards may soon
require tracking technology "For Your Safety (TM)".

~~~
randlet
I think a bigger threat is from insurance companies[1]. "Want insurance? Sure
but first you just need to install this black box in your car!"

[1] [http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/car-tracking-devices-spark-
pri...](http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/car-tracking-devices-spark-privacy-
concerns-1.1366687)

~~~
occam65
Agreed, the concerning theme is the required usage of tracking software,
without the opportunity to opt-out in an effective way.

------
alexholehouse
Original article: [http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-exec-
gps-2014-1](http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-exec-gps-2014-1)

------
joering2
Okay, this wasn't Denis Rodman or some other mindless crackhead speaking; it
was high exec of Ford.

Think for a moment; why would he come on the record to state this and then
back it down? Obviously, to protect the company! Its a PR stunt. Just like IRS
learnt to scoop people's swimming pools that haven't been taxed via Google
Earth, my bet is that the same way state/federalies are looking for extra
places to milk you.

Everyone is speeding or sped at some point; the amount of money waiting to be
collected must be humongous. Its just a matter of how they go retroactively
with it. My bet is that they will make it "good news" that even if you speed
40 miles above, your license won't be suspended, we just gonna fine you
$1,000. Can't pay? we leave it up to the IRS (the best mob to collect dues on
the face of Earth).

But him coming out to say that is just introduction to "don't tell us later we
haven't told u + you could opt out anytime by clicking some checkbox + we have
to comply with Feds" combination.

Prepare for more.

------
ankitoberoi
I drive a Ford (No GPS) and I'm not sure if any ford car here in India has GPS
which uploads the data.

I'm curious: How does the upload happen - In-built SIM? Who pays for the Data?

~~~
ef47d35620c1
Radio waves. There are GPS jammers. Many truck drivers use them:

[http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-57597971-71/truck-
driver-h...](http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-57597971-71/truck-driver-has-
gps-jammer-accidentally-jams-newark-airport/)

~~~
dingaling
GPS is receive-only. The article to which you linked involves a man with a GPS
jammer that prevented reception of GPS signals in the local area and hence
prevented derivation of location.

What the parent poster was asking is how Ford upload the derived location.

~~~
ef47d35620c1
Ah, I misunderstood the question. Thanks for the clarification.

------
awjr
Privacy issues aside, a more interesting analysis would be to determine what
percentage of car drivers do not break the law. Assuming analysis is purely on
breaking speed limits, then further analysis could be done based on type of
road (residential, motorway, etc), % above speed limit, number of miles spent
breaking the law etc.

Correlate this data with accident black spots (insurance claims, type of
accident, time of day etc).

You could even do route analysis and focus resources (e.g. a particular area
has a large number of cars driving to schools and back, could a cycle/foot
path help alleviate this).

This would be a fantastic set of data to get your hands on.

~~~
bobtheowl2
Sadly there is more business incentive for this data to be misused than used
for good like you mention. While we are there we need to fix speed limits so
they are valid.

I propose a >2 std deviations = ticket rule. Instead of the current "we all
know it's illegal but were only be a little illegal so it's ok", that defeats
the point of having laws I think.

------
lsh123
I think there is another interesting angle here: while a death of a person
from a car driving too fast is a horrible tragedy; for the society as a whole,
it might be better to accept X deaths to get Y people to their destinations
faster. This is a common mistake in the modern political practice to use one-
time/rare events to justify stricter laws for everyone. Most obvious and well
known recent example, of course, is the establishment of TSA after 9/11\. But
the same applies to the speed limits on the road: a one-time car crash is
usually used to justify lower speed limits.

~~~
sosborn
You make a good point, but let's not pretend that crashes due to speed are
"one-time" events. There is a certain roadway near where I live that
frequently has these types of crashes. Lowering the speed limit doesn't help
of course (these people are interested in obeying any posted limit).

~~~
lsh123
I was talking about situations when a single crash on in a particular place of
the road causes the speed limit to be dropped. I have no problem with lowering
speed limits or doing other changes to the road when there is a history of
incidents. E.g. I think police & other agencies did a fantastic job on hwy 17
a few years back to make it much safer and more pleasant to drive.

------
gnu8
This guy should be indicted immediately, as an accessory to all of the crimes
he knows about and hasn't reported.

------
debacle
Why not link to the original source instead of slashdot? You might as well be
linking to blogspam.

------
rjzzleep
how come no one linked the eula like on slashdot ?
[https://support.ford.com/tools/account/sync-
terms](https://support.ford.com/tools/account/sync-terms)

"Ford may use the vehicle information it collects, as well as information
regarding individual access to Vehicle Health Reports at www.syncmyride.com
for any purpose"

~~~
ds9
What's concerning about that is that you can't opt out. It's part of a service
that is supposedly optional, but the linked document repeatedly emphasizes
that the terms apply upon any use of the service, even by someone who's never
seen the terms.

Hopefully that's not enforceable, but the judicial history with software
licensing suggests that it would be.

~~~
rjzzleep
well if you have enough money than no it's not enforceable. as it stands it's
basically a you're giving me everything and i'm letting you know officially,
sue me if you can.

------
gaius
We're linking to Slashdot now? Why not a link to the original article?

------
akgerber
Universal tracking built into cars isn't the solution, but remember that
speeding, especially in urban neighborhoods full of pedestrians, isn't a
victimless crime: cars at 20mph have 5% odds of killing pedestrians in a
crash, cars at 30mph kill ~40% of the time, and cars at 40mph kill 85% of the
time[0]. So please stop speeding, and I'll keep advocating for automated
traffic enforcement to protect my life.

[0][http://humantransport.org/sidewalks/SpeedKills.htm](http://humantransport.org/sidewalks/SpeedKills.htm)

~~~
headShrinker
Your use FUD to justify unwarranted spying and data collection for the use of
prosecution is stunning. Not to mention it's a violation of the constitution.

~~~
mikeyouse
It's a violation of the constitution for a private company to collect data on
a product that they sell you, when they tell you ahead of time they'll be
collecting that data?

Wow, those framers thought of everything.

~~~
headShrinker
> So please stop speeding, and I'll keep advocating for automated traffic
> enforcement to protect my life.

Please pay attention. Things move fast around here.

~~~
mikeyouse
What about automated traffic enforcement is unconstitutional again?

~~~
headShrinker
Aren't we discussing Ford privately collecting information and disseminating
it to some company to send out violations? That is what this entire thread is
about isn't?

------
homersapien
It won't be long until the Feds have technology that grabs metadata from the
tech in your car as you cruise down the road. I suspect their definition of
"metadata" will be broad enough to include things like speed, rate of
acceleration, latitude/longitude (if car is equipped with GPS, of course),
etc. Seems crazy, except that most of us probably thought the idea of
government backdoors in Google, Facebook, etc. to be "crazy" until very
recently.

~~~
johnward
What makes you think they don't have the technology now?

------
kordless
My issue with stuff like this is this: I don't get paid for them using data
that is tied to my behaviors and I don't know what they do with that data once
they get it. I'd be down with selling them the data if they were willing to
bid on it, as long as I know what they did with it later (and got paid if they
shared it with others).

------
galvan
The traffic analysis case seems to be a lot like the way Google aggregates
smartphone GPS data to do real-time traffic for Google Maps [0] [0]
[http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/bright-side-of-
sittin...](http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/bright-side-of-sitting-in-
traffic.html)

------
johnward
I'm not saying I'm ok with this but since OnStar was released I assumed
someone was tracking vehicles. Especially when they announced the theft
deterrent systems such as tracking and remotely disabling a vehicle.

~~~
uptown
They got themselves into some shit when they announced their plans to continue
tracking vehicles that were capable of OnStar even if the owner wasn't a
subscriber. Since making this announcement, they backtracked on this plan ...
but makes you wonder whether they really did since it's clearly possible for
them to continue collecting vehicle data unless you disable with with the
correct jumpers.

[http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/27/onstar-
backtracks...](http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/27/onstar-backtracks-
on-collection-of-data-from-ex-subscribers/?_r=0)

------
elwell
[http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-jim-farley-retracts-
stat...](http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-jim-farley-retracts-statements-
tracking-drivers-gps-2014-1)

------
pmorici
The other way to look at it is they also know when you aren't breaking the law
so maybe you could subpeona Ford's records to prove that cop was lying when he
said you were speeding at 25 over.

~~~
mdesq
I'd love to see large penalties for cops who could be proven to have lied
about situations.

------
altero
I wonder what are legal implications of running GPS jammer constantly.

~~~
RankingMember
Should be none, at least in the U.S. It's _your_ car.

~~~
matthewmacleod
I'm pretty sure GPS jammers are illegal in the US, though. I guess if you
wanted to wrap the antenna in aluminium foil, that wouldn't be a problem.

~~~
jasomill
Right, and you could also just disconnect the antenna. But GPS is useful for
applications that have nothing to do with tracking, so it'd be nice to have
access to devices which include strong, _legally enforceable_ guarantees
against location tracking (aside from targeted, judicially sanctioned tracking
by law enforcement, since making life difficult for cops _with warrants_ does
little more than waste taxpayer money).

------
Istof
Looks like they are fishing for a government contract.

------
xradionut
"The Hyperion grinder lottery is almost upon us! Mandatory tickets will be
sent to each household next month."

------
Zigurd
The telematics system, especially the radio, is _probably_ on a separate fuse.

------
codereflection
"...everyone who breaks the law..." Everyone? Hardly.

