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from the all-your-data-are-belong-to-us dept.
The Verge is reporting that the next data minefield is your car. GM has been capturing lots of user data from the cars they have sold and is apparently planning to sell that (stolen|coerced) data to advertisers targeting, for now, radio advertising. Newer cars generate upwards of 600GB of user data per day. This is causing business leaders to drool because some expect the value of this data to reach more than $1.5 trillion by the year 2030, if the data (capture|theft) remains uncontested. GM is the first auto maker so far to try this. The first batch took data from around 90,000 vehicles. However, there was not much detail given about how permission was gained for this data capture and whether agreement was coerced or through ignorance.
GM captured minuted details such as station selection, volume level, and ZIP codes of vehicle owners, and then used the car's built-in Wi-Fi signal to upload the data to its servers. The goal was to determine the relationship between what drivers listen to and what they buy and then turn around and sell the data to advertisers and radio operators. And it got really specific: GM tracked a driver listening to country music who stopped at a Tim Horton's restaurant. (No data on that donut order, though.)
Also at The Detroit Free Press : GM tracked radio listening habits for 3 months: Here's why.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by black6host on Saturday October 20 2018, @01:23AM (6 children)
What network are they using to upload 600GB a day? Can I get it for my house. Wirelessly? How do they calculate this stuff. I can't find anything but an old article from 2015 saying connected vehicles could upload up to 10GB an hour. Well, you'd need 60 an hour for ten hours of driving to get 600GB.
And where's the backup for McKinsey's estimate. From TFA:
I'm open for edification...
(Score: 1, Troll) by black6host on Saturday October 20 2018, @01:28AM
Sorry, reread summary. Still, 600GB over Wi-Fi a day? You'd have to be out driving all day so you'd not have access to Wi-Fi at that time...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 20 2018, @01:34AM
There are hundreds of sensors monitored by dozens of computers in the new cars. That's not counting the twenty or so cameras in and on the car. Each is generating a stream of telemetry while the car is on. I suspect that some sensors and their computers run while the car is off too and that others record audio.
It'd be most enlightening to see the fine print on the GM sales contracts or screen the click-throughs. However it would be unsurprising to find that they treat those customer sales contracts as trade secrets now.
(Score: 4, Funny) by c0lo on Saturday October 20 2018, @01:36AM (1 child)
Or, you know, one can drive for 60hours every day.
(grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Saturday October 20 2018, @08:04AM
Cyndi
https://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3D2y1TZXc5DiY [youtube.com]
Or Jake
https://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DYJ-jum40EGA [youtube.com]
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 3, Funny) by Nerdfest on Saturday October 20 2018, @02:59AM
I'm guessing that's the data from *all the cars*. I had the same initial reaction. Englishing is hard.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 20 2018, @05:36AM
OnStar does you through LTE now, iirc. So that means it's probably a 4g link at the very least. I'm going to guess they have more than one channel too - one for your infotainment needs, which you can turn off, one for their car info monitoring, which you can't (but can't get anything for you through, either).