Nowadays, our cars are anything but a private space — they are full blown data collection nightmares on wheels.

New Mozilla research has revealed that popular global car brands — like Chevrolet, Nissan, Toyota, Kia, Audi, Jeep, Honda, Volkswagen, and more — are collecting your deeply personal data, like your genetic information and sexual activity. This invasive harvesting of information is collected via a web of sensors, microphones, cameras and the phones, apps, and connected services you use in your vehicle.

Car companies are brazenly collecting deeply personal information about people the moment they get into a car, often without explicit consent to do so. And that’s why the Mozilla community is now coming together to force car companies to respect our right to privacy. Add your name to ask car companies to stop collecting, sharing and selling our very personal information.

Find out more about our research on cars in the official launch blog post.

33 points
*

All together now…

👏 right

👏 to

👏 privacy

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30 points

Another reason bicycles are the best form of transport 😎

You mean I get to exercise, see my city from close up, reduce my environmental impact and protect my privacy??

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10 points

Lots of bicycles are implementing spyware these days too. Obviously not “analog” bikes.

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11 points
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Deleted by creator
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2 points

they’re called e-peds sometimes.

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3 points

You mean like Van Moof? They collect a shit ton of data.

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2 points

I wouldn’t say best form of transport because it depends what you’re transporting, how far you’re going and when do you need to be there, if you’re commuting to work or cycling for pleasure.

If it really was the best form of transport, I would have a bike, but because of what my job demands it is literally impossible or insane to do.

That being said, I do miss my old bike (it got stolen 😔) and tinkering with it, super worth the money I bought it for.

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2 points
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WHO’S GOING TO CARRY THE BOATS?!

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2 points

*for now

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1 point

I don’t know that seat is probably absorbing data from your buttctack

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1 point

Im a cyclist who would love to not have to own a car but its just impossible between the suburbs, winter climate, and shitty, dirty public transport in my city. It also takes 10x longer to get anywhere. Plus anyone I know who bikes to work stinks.

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16 points

Is there such a thing as open source vehicle system software?

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11 points

Possibly. But wire cutters exist. Installing custom firmware for a car seems unnecessarily dangerous. Just remove the fuse, cut a wire or go to a local shop and get the comms system disabled.

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9 points

Easier said than done when the car has an eSIM embedded who-knows-where

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6 points

Which doesnt matter if the sim has no power.

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6 points

Unfortunately it’s not that simple. Some cars will not function properly without a cellular connection. They’re designed that way.

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4 points

Which would mean that, again, every time you enter a tunnel your car goes up in flames? I don’t know what you guys wanna tell me here but what you’re saying is bullshit.

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2 points

Then there’s a lot of the US that they’re not going to function properly in.

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6 points

Not a viable solution since this will likely result in your entire infotainment system or other features being unusable. Not having the radio in your car work or not having safety features work would suck.

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5 points

Oh no tapes tablet to car. Anyways, why would you entire infotainment system not work? You would just have no internet connection. Radio doesn’t work, yes, however most sane humans stream music anyways which is possible via bluetooth or, in case the comms module would also disable bluetooth, cable. Your choice, private sex life or ✨features✨.

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7 points

are collecting your deeply personal data, like your genetic information and sexual activity

Most of these policies are just putting in there as a sort of “catch-all” in case they collect it incidentally. I don’t see anything to indicate that they’re actively collecting this information.

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14 points

Not a great take. “I’m probably not going to take all this money that’s sitting on the table. I could if I wanted to, I just don’t know if I really want to. Maybe. Will I?”

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3 points

That’s not my “take”, that’s just the facts of the situation.

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3 points

Do all of your “the facts” start with “probably”, “possibly”, “maybe”, or “under the best circumstances when all people involved place morality over their own personal and collective best interests, despite explicitly stating that they can and will do otherwise”?

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4 points

Dr. Toyota: How 'bout no! ;)

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Privacy Guides

!privacyguides@lemmy.one

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In the digital age, protecting your personal information might seem like an impossible task. We’re here to help.

This is a community for sharing news about privacy, posting information about cool privacy tools and services, and getting advice about your privacy journey.


You can subscribe to this community from any Kbin or Lemmy instance:

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Check out our website at privacyguides.org before asking your questions here. We’ve tried answering the common questions and recommendations there!

Want to get involved? The website is open-source on GitHub, and your help would be appreciated!


This community is the “official” Privacy Guides community on Lemmy, which can be verified here. Other “Privacy Guides” communities on other Lemmy servers are not moderated by this team or associated with the website.


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