
Automakers working to transform data from cars into secondary revenue streams - reaperducer
https://carbuzz.com/news/general-motors-watches-you-listen-to-the-radio
======
isoprophlex
_And you can start testing [that] by sending them different kinds of
advertising to see some kind of behavior in the [listening] patterns.” These
are insights that are then quickly shared throughout GM’s various divisions. _

What the actual fuck. It's a car that you've paid several tens of thousands
for.

Google pestering you for personal data in return for '''''free''''' services
is terrible because they are a monopoly, but in a sense we're to blame by
expecting not to pay money for maps, mail, search. But this is about a car, on
average one of the most expensive things a person owns.

Makes you wonder... How will we look back on this day and age 40 years from
now?

~~~
grecy
> _you wonder... How will we look back on this day and age 40 years from now?_

The cynic in me wants to say we will look back and wish our things still had
off buttons.

~~~
froindt
I'd be happy if my next car had physical buttons. Putting everything on a
screen you _must_ look at is one of the most distracting and dangerous things
I can think of. I've yet to see a digital display I like better than buttons
and dials for volume, tuning, and temperature control.

~~~
hw_penfold

      one of the most distracting and 
      dangerous things I can think of
    

No worries there. You won't actually be driving your own car by then. It'll be
driving _itself_.

~~~
gambiting
I don't believe that this is actually happening for at least 50+ years. And by
that point, indeed, I won't be driving myself, but for slightly different
reasons.

~~~
TaylorAlexander
I work in the same building as Waymo. They’re very serious about self driving.
I don’t know anything about their operations internally or how well they can
handle inclement weather, but I think 50+ years is overly pessimistic. Self
driving cars work today in clear driving conditions. Personally I feel like it
may be more than ten years until we see them everywhere, but maybe it would be
less. 50? That’s just silly. I don’t think it’s such a technical challenge we
couldn’t solve it sooner.

~~~
gambiting
I mean in the 60s there was a famous project where the idea was to "solve"
image recognition, with an estimate of few months tops. It's 2018 and the best
of the best image recognition algorithms will say with 99% confidence that a
sofa in a zebra print is in fact, a zebra, and our technological leap from 60s
is just unimaginable. We have so much more computing power, yet we can't crack
it fully. I feel like autonomous driving is the same - it's going to be
amazing in some general cases, but it's going to fall apart at any normal
situation that can happen on the road - and it's those edge cases which will
take decades to work out fully and reliably. So yes, I genuinely don't believe
that we will see a fully autonomous vehicle that can work in any conditions,
on streets of San Francisco as well as rural Ukraine equally well and without
any human input.

~~~
code_duck
Sure, they will not be deployed universally but they will soon be common for
interstate trucking and taxis. Also expect to see different adoption in the US
than Europe and Japan (like Norwegian and Japanese cell networks vs the US).
Needless to say, I agree rural Ukraine may have different needs than San
Francisco. But that has nothing to do with adoption in San Francisco. Adoption
does not have to be 100% to be significant.

------
nimbius
as an engine mechanic by trade, Ive seen the 4G trend in cars ramp up over the
past 5-6 years and its more than a little startling.

From what i hear in the customer service office up front, info-tainment
universally sucks. There isnt a single manufacturer that hasnt turned the
radio and air conditioner into some sort of rube goldberg machine. the
switches on the steering wheel also adhere to absolutely no standard, so
drivers are either turning the volume up on that classic rock song they love
or setting the cruise control to plow through an intersection.

To add insult to injury, these systems are all needlessly expensive. a knob or
a button will last ten times longer than a screen, especially if the vehicle
is light truck/small business or god forbid, a family wagon/minivan.

The thing about the 4G interface software is that originally it was a powered
accessory in the vehicle, but these days its an integral component. that means
if it goes out, or you remove it, the car throws a code in the ECU and a light
shows up on the dash. Why? internal combustion doesnt require 4G. in fact most
drivers one would argue are better on the road without cellular networks.

If you want to avoid this weird 1984 wonderland of cars that spy on
passengers, go for an older car. Mileage rarely matters anymore for cars
2006+, and platforms from manufacturers can remain the same for a decade. That
means the only thing that changes is the interior cloth or shape of a button.
I drive a 2005 Dodge Charger RT, and the only two people who know the music I
like are my dog and my husband.

~~~
rootusrootus
I drive a newer car (2018 Camaro SS 1LE) and only Apple and I know what music
I listen to. Even without disabling OnStar.

Rather than living with an older car, I think we should tackle issues like
this head-on, since they're not going away. Legislation, or just making a
shitstorm for the manufacturer, stuff like that.

In this case didn't GM specifically ask people to opt-in anyway? As long as
it's overt, and not in some fine print somewhere, I don't think it's _that_
big a deal.

~~~
justtopost
One could see driving an older car as a opt-out, and boycott. As fewer cars
sell, the company to first realize the problem and the market stands to
windfall. All this tracking is why I can't stomach the tesla fanboying on HN,
we should know better than to celebrate 3rd party control of your car.

~~~
rootusrootus
That seems unrealistic, though. People who buy cars based strictly on
practicality just get something newer when their old one starts to be a
hassle. They're not going to be too interested in buying something else older
just to send a message to the manufacturer.

Another case where the masses just don't really care that much and those of us
who do get to pay the price. And ... while I say that, I admit I haven't
disabled the OnStar on my Camaro. Buddy of mine with exactly the same car did
but he's a bit more paranoid than I am, and the monthly "how shitty of a
driver are you" message from OnStar creeped him out. Whereas it just made me
want to try harder to make the score lower (it's like golf, yes?? ;-)). Now,
if they start sending the data to my insurance company, then I'm yanking out
the LTE immediately.

------
ericd
Is there any index of spyware free devices/products? Or I guess I should say
products that haven't been caught including spyware yet. This is getting
absurd.

~~~
gcb0
It's useless.

For example, I can say to you now that apple, google and samsung devices are
very high on spyware. Would you even start considering replacing your phone?

~~~
shakna
Yes... But what with?

Consumer choice for smartphones seems to be at an all-time low, when it comes
to software. (Hardware seems as diverse as ever, with a few exceptions, such
as the actual modules for talking to the cell towers.)

You have iOS, Android... And a few small OSs which only work on very specific
hardware, that tends not to be available after a year or two.

What I want from a phone is fairly limited, which I think makes me more
flexible, but I can't really find anything that doesn't spy on me.

* Calls

* SMS

* Phonebook

* Email (IMAP will do)

* SSH (with key support)

* Web browser

Anything I can find is either spyware-riddled, probably backdoored, or so out
of date that purchasing it makes it as expensive as a flagship phone.

~~~
jstanley
I run LineageOS with the F-Droid store.

The baseband is still untrustworthy, but I think that's about as good as it
gets.

~~~
gcb0
lineage os uses kernel and drivers as binary blobs from the oem themselves.
not to mention most images ship with gapps anyway.

~~~
jstanley
I didn't know the kernel and drivers are not open source, although I do of
course run an image without gapps.

------
sonaltr
We need a better way of disabling this physically - by removing the 4G/LTE
connectivity in cars.

Remove connectivity, and that data collection is moot.

I'm looking to buy a car in the coming months / year - and I've narrowed it
down to the C43, S60 and G70 and all those cars come with "connected features"
that I have no need or want for. (find your car anywhere, unlock and remote
start your car, send maps to your car, set climate control, check
fuel/servicing etc. via an app / website). I partially blame Tesla for
starting this trend.

It's absolute madness that we have cars companies that generally don't know a
ton about software building technology that's generally insecure, will not be
updated and mass producing it at scale and being used by 10000s (or even
100000s) of people worldwide. This is a recipe for a easily avoidable disaster
waiting to happen and people who've paid 10s or 100s of thousands of $ are the
victims. (and ofc they'll use this as an excuse to add more tech instead of
less making it a house of cards - Eg. Oh you want secure features - guess
what? we've added 4G/5G/LTE support. oh we'll also take in all your data to
pay for it anyways).

~~~
DoofusOfDeath
Is it as simple as physically disconnecting the car's modem, or wrapping its
cell antenna with an RF-blocking material?

~~~
kop316
I have done similar things to other devices, so I can give you a rough outline
of what to do (assuming you are in the USA). By law, anything that
transmits/receives a wireless signal must go through FCC testing, and what I
have seen is they usually make this a card with a standard I/O port (much
easier to get one card through the FCC process than a bunch of them). Look up
the "FCCID" in the owners manual, and you can go to the FCC website and find
exactly what you are looking for. The next thing you need to do is actually
find it, and that will probably be the most painful part. But once it is
found, you can simply remove it.

I had to do something similar to a sound system I owned. For some reason, they
added Bluetooth with absolutely no authentication, so anyone in range could
pair to it. I just removed the Bluetooth adaptor (it uses I2C and/or SMBus to
communicate with the rest of the system).

~~~
sonaltr
We need an ifixit site to help owners that care about such things.

You had a great point (about FCC) and I'll see if I can do something about
this for the cars I plan on getting.

~~~
kop316
I like the idea of an ifixit site for things like that.

If I were to hazard a guess, the actual modem you are looking for if in the
dash, as it seems that is where the "entertainment brains" are.

~~~
neuralRiot
Not necessarily, the modem, or telematics unit can be anywhere in the car and
communicate with the infotainment system and other modules through a data
network just like you can have the cable modem in your attic and a an ethernet
cable to your desktop.

------
olex
Well, I can tell them how I listen to the radio... as soon as ads come on, I
turn it off or tune to another station, and return no sooner than in 5 minutes
once the ads are done. That is when I listen to the radio at all, which is
rare for this exact reason; mostly it's just my own music via Bluetooth.

------
voltagex_
"The automaker is executed tests of some 90,000 drivers across the Chicago and
Los Angeles areas from November 2017 through to January 2018 after those
drivers gave permission for their data to be processed in this manner."

~~~
dawnerd
How was the permission gathered? If it’s anything like what Toyota does then
it’s a mailer that you must respond to to opt out.

~~~
GoodDreams
Hyundai wouldn’t let me buy a car without agreeing to data collection.

~~~
bachmeier
So how does that work if you sell the car? They'd be tracking the new owner
without permission.

~~~
NullPrefix
It could be in the original agreement that if you sell the car, you can only
sell to someone who also agrees to being spied on.

I mean, they could try putting the onus on the seller.

~~~
bachmeier
They could try, but ultimately Hyundai is spying without permission. Hyundai
could sue the original owner for damages that arise from not being able to
spy, but I'm guessing they'd go ahead and keep spying when they shouldn't. The
original owner can't be held responsible for that.

------
peterkelly
When I was a kid I was promised flying cars by 2015.

The industry chose otherwise and gave us spying cars.

------
djsumdog
I'm glad I have a 2006 car without any of this crap with a Pioneer head unit
that has no Internet access (although it can bluetooth connect to my phone;
but just for audio/calls).

Needing to update maps using an sdcard doesn't seem like a limitation at all
to me. It's a big advantage! I control when my stereo makes updates .. and my
stereo doesn't track me!

------
alexpw
At a minimum, it's nice to read this tracking relies on the 4g wifi from
OnStar to be active (included in the higher-tier of their paid service). Nice,
because I've cancelled their service. However, even after you've cancelled
OnStar, there is still basic tracking enabled, but not this radio non-sense.

If they're going to sell our listening habits and whatever else, then at least
they can give us the wifi for free.

After getting a GM/Chevy recently, it reminded me of removing the bloatware on
a cheap Windows laptop, except in this case, I didn't have the option to
install a fresh OS. It comes bundled with free trials of OnStar and Sirius,
both of which employ tactics to keep you onboard. Sigh...

~~~
stephengillie
What tactics do SiriusXM employ to retain you? When my trial expired, they
just sent me a few snail mails begging for money. Easy enough to bin.

~~~
alexpw
Sirius was email, snail mail, and phone calls -- standard stuff, but over the
top.

OnStar required calling to cancel. They provide a web UI where you can add a
new payment method but you can not remove all payment methods or cancel. Once
you've convinced the person on the phone that you want to cancel, a new option
to remove your payment method appears in the UI. The person on the phone
didn't tell me to go back to the UI, I was just paranoid and saw it by
accident.

I'd read enough horror stories on consumer affairs with, for example, people
still being charged after they canceled.

------
jpindar
I wonder if at some point there is going to be a market for fully built kit
cars - that is, newly built cars, but without electronics that phone home.

~~~
userbinator
They're called "hot rods", and there's always been a small market for them.
Depending on where you live the legal requirements to get one licensed vary
from "easy" to "impossible", but it won't be cheap.

~~~
0xfeba
Home built vehicles can be registered just about anywhere as long as they have
headlights, taillights, and a license plate light.

~~~
brokenmachine
No engineer's certificate?

------
petepete
Perhaps GM can also use their super fancy studies to realise that having owned
my car for 8 years I can recite the navigation system's safety notice from
memory and don't need it to be displayed _every single time_ I use it. I don't
even use it for navigation most of the time, I just like it to display the
name of the road I'm currently on or sometimes my current map position. Having
a message pop up that I need to dismiss is so annoying.

It's a total clusterfuck of an UX.

~~~
wild_preference
Maybe it’s required by law since my mother’s VW and now Subaru print a similar
message each time as well.

~~~
drewg123
I imagine it is some best-practice CYA suggested by corporate lawyers. It does
not happen on my Tesla

------
yuhong
This is what happens when people are treated as "consumers" to be extracted
from. The current debt-based economy encourages this kind of behavior.

------
voltagex_
I can only find one other source for this news and there's no press releases
that I can find. Perhaps someone with access to advertising trade journals
could dig something up?

[https://www.warc.com/newsandopinion/news/general_motors_gene...](https://www.warc.com/newsandopinion/news/general_motors_generates_new_radio_advertising_insights/41073)
won't load for me.

Edit: got it - [http://gmauthority.com/blog/2018/09/gm-studies-drivers-
radio...](http://gmauthority.com/blog/2018/09/gm-studies-drivers-radio-
listening-habits-for-new-ad-insights/) \- The automaker’s director/global
digital transformation, Saejin Park, said at the Association of National
Advertisers’ (ANA) 2018 Data & Measurement Conference that the new insights
can help serve up better ads.

------
mrhappyunhappy
“The automaker is executed tests of some 90,000 drivers across the Chicago and
Los Angeles areas from November 2017 through to January 2018 after those
drivers gave permission for their data to be processed in this manner.”

Hey, we’ve updated TOS, accept to continue using this service!

~~~
brokenmachine
I would love to know the details of exactly how those drivers gave permission,
and what the alternative was if they wanted to decline.

------
monochromatic
It’s enough to make you want to go build a house on Walden Pond and live there
alone forever.

~~~
grecy
Come on up to Alaska/Yukon! You won't regret it.

Even after living there for only 4 years it was always extremely jarring to go
to Vancouver once a year and catch a train or bus with all the advertising on
every surface, people buried on their phones, consumerism, pollution, etc.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
"X is a beautiful place with low population density and you can get away from
most of the world's problems" is exactly the message you shouldn't be
broadcasting if you want X to stay like that.

I guess you get a little more leeway with the Yukon because it's so far away
from major population centers.

~~~
grecy
...and it's often past -40

I know what you're saying, but the phenomenal thing about the Yukon is that if
people don't like the isolation, or the cold, or whatever, they simply leave.
Not a person lives there that doesn't love it, and that is part of the reason
it's fantastic. I have never heard a person complain about it, or talk about
going somewhere else, or say "I wish I was in xyz right now".

------
stephengillie
Previous:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18069875](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18069875)

------
scotty79
I can't listen to radio while I'm driving. I'm feeling it drains my attention
and I feel like I need 100% of it while I'm driving.

------
costcopizza
As an car enthusiast, driving represents freedom and escape, quite hard to do
when you're tethered with this connected junk.

------
qubax
GM should name their next model "The Abyss" \- "when you stare at it, it
stares back at you".

Seems like so much of the tech/business ecosystem is now centered around
spying on you. Your OS, amazon's echo, social media, laptops, etc.

------
josefresco
"GM still isn’t entirely sure where this research will lead them, or what
exactly it plans to do with the information."

Sounds like they were sold a fancy tracking concept without any actual
practical applications.

------
LeonM
Who listens to radio anyway? Just use spotify et al, no ads. Sure, spotify
tracks my music preferences too, but I don't see any harm in that, it just
makes the experience better.

~~~
staz
and then ignore all that and shove Drake down your throat anyway

~~~
LeonM
Haven't had that (I actually had to google Drake, never heard of him). It
probably depends on how you use the service, I never use the front page or top
charts functions.

~~~
shakna
> It probably depends on how you use the service

Not... Really.

He was placed on the cover of every album for the front page, top charts, and
a hell of a lot of other playlists as well [1], including playlists that
didn't feature him (half of playlists, according to Reddit detectives).

It was so bad, that Spotify was issuing refunds [0], because they basically
had one artist take over the whole site.

As my anecdotal example of the insanity of the promo, I had Drake featured in
playlists for Symphonic Metal. From Nightwish to Drake... Is a hell of a
transition.

[0]
[https://twitter.com/notkaranarora/status/1013862692396781568...](https://twitter.com/notkaranarora/status/1013862692396781568/photo/1)

[1] [https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-
media/image/upload/ds67rbqvl3...](https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-
media/image/upload/ds67rbqvl3gopygseidq.png)

~~~
ecnal798
>Nightwish to Drake

We really are living in a dystopia now aren't we?

------
kleiba
...and still not as terrifying as this old news from three years ago:
[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/road-and-rail-
transp...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/road-and-rail-
transport/11569453/All-cars-must-have-tracking-devices-to-cut-road-deaths-
says-EU.html)

------
automoton1
Are there any startups/new players/existing players that are building cars
(2017/2018) that are energy efficient (electric/hybrid) and don't violate your
privacy by phoning home?

------
decasteve
There is no such thing as bad publicity? The article is a marketing piece in
any case. There is no actual analysis but lots of nice product photos.

------
cuboidGoat
This modern tracking stuff will get used for a genocide before we ban it, I
guarantee. Previous totalitarian states couldn't have even dreamed of this
kind of shit.

------
xj9
yeah, definitely made the right call opting to restore an 89 Bronco II. i have
a lot left to learn about it, but at least its simple enough for me to
understand and ford parts (even for old cars) are plentiful.

------
ubermonkey
People still listen to the radio?

~~~
crysin
Everyday. Being able to turn my car on, have the station already set and not
use any sort of data I have to pay / account for is irreplaceable. I also get
a variety of information from the morning talk show that I wouldn't have
otherwise heard or learned about for the metro area. You also might not
believe this but there are also people still using cable for television, crazy
I know.

