Privacy again - Mercedes Tracking Customers.

[Marinatall_Ironside]

42 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

While that is true, any such system should only be activated in the event of a breach. It appears in this case it is not. Nor should users have to worry about loosing features if they decide they don’t want unknown parties tracking their every move. Nor should company car drivers be tracked by unknown third parties simply because they have a benefit car. Nor should second owners be tracked after they have paid off the car. When Facebook or Apple get accused of any infringement on people privacy they get attacked, but when loved car brands do the same they get defended by many. Very duplicitous.

 It's hard to offer a factual comment on the issue of data collection and privacy. Until there's legislation in effect. Right now that's not the case, at least here in the U.S. And if they are, then those pieces of legislation do jack-shit anyways, from the bureaucratic side at least. So it's like those laws didn't exist at all. If you're going to regulate data collection, regulate all pieces of identifiable location, anonymous or not. That includes your location too, even if said location isn't personally identifiable.

 

And for such features like "Car-to-X" to even function, you need to consent to data collection so that the associated entities that make such a feature work, work. Not like that feature is any useful to me

 

You also need to remember that Tesla does this too to make many features like Autopilot work at all. For Autopilot to work, guess what you need to consent to? Location tracking!

Edited August 26, 2019 by Jurunce

[Drak3]

45 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

The role of satire is to make people think. Any comment that seems in poor taste does just that, makes people think. 

At this point, most people think one of two things when they hear something being compared to Nazism.

 

1. Ban it.
2. That person doesn't have a valid argument, and thus, opinion.

[Marinatall_Ironside]

48 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

The role of satire is to make people think. Any comment that seems in poor taste does just that, makes people think. 

You can still make people think without using satire, like how academics and scholars make people think when they go to submit publications to academia.

[Guest]

7 hours ago, Jurunce said:

 It's hard to offer a factual comment on the issue of data collection and privacy. Until there's legislation in effect. Right now that's not the case, at least here in the U.S. And if they are, then those pieces of legislation do jack-shit anyways, from the bureaucratic side at least. So it's like those laws didn't exist at all. If you're going to regulate data collection, regulate all pieces of identifiable location, anonymous or not. That includes your location too, even if said location isn't personally identifiable.

 

And for such features like "Car-to-X" to even function, you need to consent to data collection so that the associated entities that make such a feature work, work. Not like that feature is any useful to me

 

You also need to remember that Tesla does this too to make many features like Autopilot work at all. For Autopilot to work, guess what you need to consent to? Location tracking!

Here in the EU there is legislation and rightly so. It is not about the collection in itself, but the need to be open and honest about the how and why that data is shared and most importantly with whom. Mercedes in this case are not being open and up front and to me this is the problem. Other companies make it very obvious they are collecting data and sharing it, and will usually tell you where that data is going. I am all for being tracked for the right reasons. I am happy for ANPR to cover the country if it helps keep us safe. I have nothing to hide. 
 

I have personally been on the wrong side of poor data management and sharing in the past resulting in my apprehension by the police in London while legitimately driving a hire car. It is not a nice feeling, especially when you have done nothing wrong. In my case it was quickly sorted and the police had to have a word with the leaseholders of the car and their bailiff. Fortunately for me this same car had been stopped while another customer was using it in another part of the country so it was the police data that meant I only wasted a few hours in a cell. For the chap that previously hired the same car I was told he was detained a lot longer. Now I know this sort of thing can and does happed quite often as it turns out, I now carry all the right paperwork and documents in the car. Whenever I get a hire car, I insist it is supplied with all those documents for my protection. They do grumble often, but I just ignore their protests. The point being, now I have a better understanding of how poor data management can be, especially with some third parties, I have the ability and knowledge to deal with many of the possible resulting problems.

[Monkey Dust]

9 hours ago, Jurunce said:

Exactly. People seem to be ignorant that a lease means they don't own it, the bank, dealer, or whoever you negotiated with to pay off a car over a time period, owns it. There's also agreements with what you can do and can't with your car (e.g. bolting on performance mods or body kits) that the leasing company says, otherwise rates go up or they can repo it.

 

Want to be the one that owns the car and no one else and do whatever you want with it? Buy it outright, in whole, and at the negotiated final sale price instead!

There is no guarantee that even if you buy the car outright that the 'feature' is disabled. Though Google or Apple, depending on your preference, knows were you are at all times. It's just another unaccountable private company tracking your whereabouts, once you have allowed one, does more of them really matter?

[williamcll]

Why are people even buying cars they cannot afford? You will never make use of its performance.

[cluelessgenius]

well this all depends on the implementation.

 

i personally am fine with anonymized gps data to just detect where a lot of drivers are standing around to detect traffic jams. i really love how google can tell me not only where traffic jams are but even rate each street in terms of how busy it is right now. big life saver sometimes and again as long as its not about the individual but only to detect blobs of devices thats fine by me.

that being said. i feel google is better for that since almost everyone around here has an android phone at least more people than there are driving mercedes.

for crashes i think its even more literally a life saver. like a distress beacon that activates when a crash has been detected. ideally with a maybe a 10 second or so countdown so you can cancel it in case youre concious and just got a bit rear ended. but if youre actually in a ditch somewhere maybe at night cause a deer jump into the street or something thats amazing.

 

for reposession idk. i mean at that point it is technically their car still and if you are activly hiding it that is kinda against what you agreed on when you bought it. so can you be mad at them for using everything they got to find it? idk.

 

all that being said the fact that all this is virtually unsupervised and its up to mercedes to decide when to look you up or not does worry me.

 

i realize this post is already long anough but i figure i had to also mention that i work very closely with all kinds of car manufacturers as not to name anyone and i gotta tell you guys. its not getting better. car to car communication is next and soon well have and wide network of data out there. anyone remember back when it was asked why anyone would need a personal computer in their home. well soon after everyone had a pc at home and now virtually everyone is hooked up to the internet. now everyone has a connected pc in their pocket and very soon cars will be the same way.

if you think today is a lot. you just wait and see. everyones so worried about cameras in citys but thanks to self driving cars well have 20 cameras on each and every one of us as soon as you leave the house. and nothing to do about it but to trust the companys to be responsible ...idk man.

once the majority has these systems at some point politicits will notice the potential and use them for hunting down criminals. 

and soon theyll be able to find anyone that doesnt fit into the picture. what im saying is i dont trust the maufacturers to handle all that data but i also sont even neccessarily want the government to control it. its just to powerful. noone should have that much power.

 

[Guest]

4 minutes ago, cluelessgenius said:

well this all depends on the implementation.

 

. noone should have that much power.

 

With great power comes great responsibility...

 

Well said though. In my case poor data management with a third party caused an old database to be used. So the third party without checking had the hire car I was in listed and reported as stolen, when it was not. The database was four months out of date. It resulted not only in my detention for a few hours, but a lot of wasted police time and ultimately tax payers money. According to the police it is not uncommon an event. So we simple cannot trust the way our data is being treated. So we need full disclosure.

[cluelessgenius]

40 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

 So we need full disclosure.

the thing is full disclosure to a lot of companies sound like giving up trade secrets. for a lot of them the way they handle the data ia big part of why they are so successful and making everyone show their hand isnt gonna work

[bcredeur97]

no link to the PCmag article OP? You mentioned it but I don't see a link

[mr moose]

21 hours ago, Phill104 said:

It is only bad taste if you choose to take it that way. Some people would take offence at another wearing leather, or drinking milk. If people are offended so what, that is their choice.

Ricky Gervais said

The role of satire is to make people think. Any comment that seems in poor taste does just that, makes people think. 

The problem with that is it assumes people like Ricky Gervais are right.  It also assumes opinions are only of value if you agree with them.

 

You only quoted him because you are with him and think he is right.  There frequently is no definitive way to determine who is right/wrong when an opinion results in offense.   

[Guest]

19 minutes ago, mr moose said:

The problem with that is it assumes people like Ricky Gervais are right.  It also assumes opinions are only of value if you agree with them.

 

You only quoted him because you are with him and think he is right.  There frequently is no definitive way to determine who is right/wrong when an opinion results in offense.   

I cause offence just by existing. I’ve had two people try and get me sacked because they took offence to me photographing a gay wedding. I had a boss take offence when I refused politely to join the team for food at a pig roast as I am veggie and his attitude was that I should eat it anyway, if have offended many because I’m am an atheist, because I am Aspergers, I am blocked by many on twitter as I am anti hunting. It is heir choice to be offended, not mine, If everyone thought the same and agreed on everything life would not only be boring, but would be stuck in a limbo state. Discussion, disagreement and strong opinion drives progress.

 

I have no malice in me against any individual and do not comment or write anything with an intent to offend any individual. We all have a right to share our beliefs. I will continue to do so and will certainly not be changing the way I write. I insulted a brand, nothing more.

 

Just as an aside, your quote of my quote has stripped the Ricky Gervais quote. It now looks in your quote that my words were those of Ricky Gervais. It’s making my head hurt.... Oh, and neither assumes they are right, only they believe what they say is.

[mr moose]

3 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

I cause offence just by existing. I’ve had two people try and get me sacked because they took offence to me photographing a gay wedding. I had a boss take offence when I refused politely to join the team for food at a pig roast as I am veggie and his attitude was that I should eat it anyway, if have offended many because I’m am an atheist, because I am Aspergers, I am blocked by many on twitter as I am anti hunting.

 

And?  There is a difference between people taking offense at something you are doing (or refusing to do) as a part of normal life and you intentionally saying something (calling it satire) then believing only your opinion about offense is all that matters.

 

3 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

It is heir choice to be offended, not mine, If everyone thought the same and agreed on everything life would not only be boring, but would be stuck in a limbo state. Discussion, disagreement and strong opinion drives progress.

It can only be someones choice to be offended if they chose to be in a place to hear you say something offensive.  Otherwise it was not their choice.  They had to hear you say it in a public place.

 

3 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

I have no malice in me against any individual and do not comment or write anything with an intent to offend any individual. We all have a right to share our beliefs. I will continue to do so and will certainly not be changing the way I write. I insulted a brand, nothing more.

 

Intent is irrelevant,  you think you only insulted a brand, but you linked it to any entire group of people in a negative way.

 

As I said, people tend to think only their opinions on this are absolute.  You think you are right because you can't see how language can be offensive and you don't seem to understand the difference between saying something publicly and privately.

 

 

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, mr moose said:

And?  There is a difference between people taking offense at something you are doing (or refusing to do) as a part of normal life and you intentionally saying something (calling it satire) then believing only your opinion about offense is all that matters.

 

It can only be someones choice to be offended if they chose to be in a place to hear you say something offensive.  Otherwise it was not their choice.  They had to hear you say it in a public place.

 

 

Intent is irrelevant,  you think you only insulted a brand, but you linked it to any entire group of people in a negative way.

 

As I said, people tend to think only their opinions on this are absolute.  You think you are right because you can't see how language can be offensive and you don't seem to understand the difference between saying something publicly and privately.

 

 

And your final comment says a lot. It suggests it is OK to be racist in private, as long as you don’t say it publicly. Racism is always wrong no matter where it is said.  Intent has everything to do with it, as does context. People thinking they have to defend another is also offensive if they are capable of defending themselves. It is condescending.

 

I have not idea what you are after, but I have said enough in the matter. Feel free to respond in any way you wish, I have wasted enough time on it and have better things to do.

[mr moose]

10 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

And your final comment says a lot. It suggests it is OK to be racist in private, as long as you don’t say it publicly. Racism is always wrong no matter where it is said.

You missed the point, you are trying to claim that all offense is chosen, it is not there are only certain conditions where people can choose to be offended, ergo they chose to participate in a discussion that is not public.  this is a public forum, people come here to read tech news, if they have to read someone associating a private company with nazi attributes then they haven't chosen anything.

 

10 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

 Intent has everything to do with it, as does context. People thinking they have to defend another is also offensive if they are capable of defending themselves. It is condescending.

 

Intent has nothing to do with it.  now you are taking offense at someone being offended because you don't think they have the right not to be offended.

 

10 minutes ago, Phill104 said:

I have not idea what you are after, but I have said enough in the matter. Feel free to respond in any way you wish, I have wasted enough time on it and have better things to do.

 

Great way to ignore the issue and try to preempt a last word, I am not going to stop discussing something just because you seem overwhelmed by the discussion.   You are trying to defend unnecessarily offensive language by pretending it is all the fault of the person who read it.   You chose to use the swastika to infer a negative connotation regarding Mercedes,  No one chose to come into a tech forum to hear a company be lumped in with a genocidal regime.  Therefore the notion of offense being a choice is not absolute and in now way an excuse to say silly things.

[Tech Enthusiast]

My BMW 5 is doing this as well. 

I would not call it a "privacy concern" tho, but a needed tool that makes some of the features I use possible in the first place.

 

You are free to get a copy of all the data they collect. And I have yet to see something that is not needed for some feature I use myself.

Cars are talking to each other for example. When I am on the Autobahn I may get a warning due to items on the street ahead. I even get to see the exact position on the map, so I can drive carefully around that spot. Driving around 180-200 mph around Munich and not being notified of random obstacles on the Autobahn seems like a pretty bad idea.

 

How does it work? Well: All the sensors around the high-end cars can see obstacles and save them. The data gets sent to the servers and all other BMWs get the information. If they are close, the warning is triggered.

 

For this to work they HAVE to save the geo position, or at least analyze it all the time.

 

If you don't want to be tracked or feel like "someone" may be coming for you,... well,.. don't use a modern car I guess?

I will gladly take the "privacy hit" for the added safety these tools provide for my family and me.