Rafi Alam from CHOICE told The World Today: “When we looked at Toyota’s privacy policy, we found that these Connected Services features will collect data such as fuel levels, odometer readings, vehicle location and driving data, as well as personal information like phone numbers and email addresses.”
The program’s policy document says Toyota collects data for various purposes if drivers don’t opt out — including for safety, security, research, product development and data analysis — but the company may also share it with third parties such as finance and insurance companies, debt collection agencies and market research organisations.
In 2023, the Mozilla Foundation reviewed the privacy standards of 25 major car brands, including Toyota. All 25 received failing marks for consumer privacy.
The report found brands such as BMW, Ford, Toyota, Tesla, Kia, and Subaru could “collect deeply personal data such as sexual activity, immigration status, race, facial expressions, weight, health and genetic information, and where you drive”, which they could potentially sell to third parties.
Nissan was accused of being “the very worst offender”, while Toyota was found to have “a near-incomprehensible galaxy of 12 privacy policy documents”.
Can you trust them with everything about what you do in the car, what you say in the car, who’s in the car, where it goes, your connections to every other online data service?
As someone who loves the bells and whistles and who recently bought a new vehicle last year a lot of the safety features are really nice to have but of all the tech features I thought I wanted I don’t really use. If I can conveniently stream audio from my phone or have a larger screen than my phone for navigation that’s placed somewhere I can glance at I would be happy. At least that’s what I’d tell my past self.
That said I wouldn’t be too paranoid about the data the car is collecting because your cell phone and everyones phone around you is collecting the same information (edit: not that you shouldn’t be concerned about that either). It’s just that these manufacturers are realizing theres money to be made here, it’s probably why GM wants to stop including Apple Car play or Android Auto so there’s less fingers in the cookie jar.
Could you imagine living somewhere that you could commute locally and just work remotely and not need such a finacial burden in your life? What a fantasy 😔
LoL, I must be living the ‘life of Riley’, then. My commute is less than a mile, and almost always by bike. And most of my errands, etc can be done by bike, as well. And yet the need for a car in our family is indeed extant.
Let me guess - because while your home is ideally located for your daily commute, it’s not ideally located for the rest of your family?
I love travelling by bike, but unfortunately it’s just not possible to find a home that is within cycling distance for everywhere anyone in our household needs to go. Right now it’s pretty much only my kid’s school, but in a couple years he’ll be older and need to move to another school, which won’t be as close. We live about half way in between my work and my partner’s work - which is 30 minutes each way (by car) in opposite directions… it’s not really practical to take a bus either (cycling is faster, because it’s not a direct bus route). So, two cars in our household. I try to cycle to work twice a week or so, whenever I can spare the extra time, but my partner can’t do that since there are no safe cycling paths on her commute.
More or less like that regarding work. And on weekends it’s nice to go places, and/or have a vehicle to haul stuff. But that’s not everyday. So yeah, common ownership of a vehicle for roadtrips, and/or hauling stuff would be an elegant solution.