What data does your car gather about you? Where does it go? Who has access to it?

Quite the story today from Washington Post technology columnist Geoffrey Fowler [@geoffreyfowler], and quite the viral quote: “Cars now run on the new oil: your data.”

Most cars sold in America in 2020 will ship to consumers with built-in and always-on Internet connections, and multiple on-board computers. Where does all that data go?

“We’re at a turning point for driving surveillance — and it’s time for car makers to come clean,” Fowler writes. Make sure to read the whole piece in the Washington Post, in addition to the insightful extras in his Twitter thread.

And -- Get a load of the forensics experiment he did with the help of a computer security professional. It's not easy getting them out of the vehicle's hardware, for starters!

What does your car know about you?

In my latest @washingtonpost privacy experiment, I tried to find out from a Chevy.

The dashboard didn’t say. It wasn’t in the manual or GM’s obtuse privacy policy.

To glimpse my car data, we had to hack our way in: https://t.co/I4oBBjyrkb pic.twitter.com/HTDqIuSGaQ

 Geoffrey A. Fowler (@geoffreyfowler) December 17, 2019

I had help doing a car privacy autopsy from Jim Mason, a forensic engineer.

That involved cracking open the dashboard to access just one of the car's many computers.

Don’t try this at home — we had to take the computer into the shop to get repaired.https://t.co/9vRRwZgD3V pic.twitter.com/zaCNGRdVCd

 Geoffrey A.

Read the rest

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/Dl-B14dc2as/cars-now-run-on-the-new-oil.html