-
Want to remove ads? Register an account and login to see fewer ads, and become a Supporting Member to remove almost all ads.
-
We are looking for another podcast participant who can act as a lead co-host to join the TMC Podcast. If you are interested in participating please see this thread.
Anyone have State Farm Drive Safe?
- Thread starter LittleLebowski
- Start date
I've been in the program a couple of years with 3 cars. They periodically ask for milage updates but I haven't noticed if it's correlated with anything.
I suspect they use it as a check to make sure you're actually using the sensor and not leaving it in the garage for half your trips. If the sensor thinks you're travelled 3,000 miles and you report a odometer reading 10,000 miles ahead of the last one then something's amiss.
I admittedly don't have much evidence of this but your phone already has accelerometers, gyroscopes, and GPS. They don't need a bluetooth dongle thing to collect that info and it would be more expensive to do that (plus it would drain the non-rechargeable battery a LOT faster). The dongle is most likely just for the app to easily tell when you're in the car.
I've just dropped my dongle somewhere down in the center console and seems to work fine. My trips show the, uh, expected number of hard acceleration, cornering, braking, etc events. LOL. I personally try my best to get as many acceleration events as possible. Means I'm having fun.
chisss
Member
Ah, I they gave me a new dongle and unfortunately I just tossed the old one. Otherwise I'd go chop it in half for you and see what sort of chips are in there
andaconda
Member
I am truly shocked at the number of people saying they use the tracking device. Every time I've seen an insurance company promote their big brother track your every move device I think "who would ever use that?" but I guess some people are okay with it and getting savings. To me, it's a very scary road to go down. Definition of slippery slope.
I kind of get that but what specifically are the risks for me? State Farm raises my rates substantially? They can already do that if they want to (and sometimes insurance companies do). I'll switch if it financially makes.
I don't quite see how it's a slippery slope, again because I can switch insurance. Or did you mean in a collective sense across all drivers?
Genuinely curious here. For a while I was going to not enroll in the tracking thing, but then I decided it seemed like extra money for me with downsides that I literally haven't thought about for a long time (until this thread!)
rhumbliner
Member
The rate on my R1T dropped $49 every 6 months when I added the dongle. I have to imagine there’s no human hunched over a computer screen watching my every move so I’m not worried about an invasion of privacy. I’d guess the data is fed into a computer along with thousands (millions?) of other drivers and it spits out a rate reduction based on the data. I feel its a good way to insulate myself from having to pay for the crazy drivers out there.
Downside for you and slippery slope arguments:
1: Insurance co starts combining your driving log across insurance companies so if they decide to increase your rate because of a swerve you made or a harsh stop or whatever, there will be no where for you to go because you're now labeled a dangerous driver. Very easy to see the next step being sharing driving records across insurance companies just like a credit score. Remember, the FICO score and whole credit scoring system has only been in common use ~30 years. Very easy to see this just being the next evolution of it.
2: Insurance co is hacked (which is increasingly likely as the dataset gets larger, more accurate, and more valuable) and now everywhere you have ever driven is out there for anyone to see.
3: Government can now request to see every place you've ever driven, when, how fast, etc. They can start issuing tickets based on knowing you were going 57 in that 50mph zone, or 28 in a 20mph school zone or that you did not come to a complete stop at that stop sign at 5th ave and main street.
4: Insurance co starts selling your location data just as so many consumer apps already do... except it now covers every place you've ever went and not just the times you open an app.
5. If you have to allow your location ALL the time in the app, what prevents the insurance co from seeing your location EVERYWHERE you go whether you are driving or not? Just their pinky promise that they won't process that data or store it?
6. I could go on and on. It's very scary, 1984, and dystopian to me.
All very reasonable points! Good writeup. And I agree on a broad, societal level.
Ultimately I guess I just don't care that much about privacy (for myself, obviously!). I don't really go anywhere that would be problematic if shared. I can see how others do, something like visiting an abortion clinic comes to mind...
Points 1 and 3 could be a big problem, especially since my whole motivation is to save a little money. I'm hoping the data they collect today isn't used in future across all insurance companies and for law enforcement / ticketing, and if that becomes a thing then I could reevaluate in future.
Ultimately I guess I just don't care that much about privacy (for myself, obviously!). I don't really go anywhere that would be problematic if shared. I can see how others do, something like visiting an abortion clinic comes to mind...
Points 1 and 3 could be a big problem, especially since my whole motivation is to save a little money. I'm hoping the data they collect today isn't used in future across all insurance companies and for law enforcement / ticketing, and if that becomes a thing then I could reevaluate in future.
what coincidence, just signed up wife and 2 kids other day. already paying high rates for kids insurance so this will definitely help as they are safe drivers anyway. i on the other hand opted out the new tesla for now at least until i've had some fun with it. as far as the paranoia, they can look at driving history all they want...there is nothing interesting about it.
do you have a smart phone? Do you use google? Then I have news for you - you’re being tracked. If you use facebook you’re being stalked. Every single one of your points can already happen without the device.
This is completely voluntary - you consent to letting them monitor your driving and in return they give you a discount. As opposed to everything else where they track you and use the information to sell your information to advertisers. You can also opt out at any time. For me it saves quite a bit of money - our Odyssey has low rates already but is hardly ever driven at this point so we get credit for the low usage. My son drives the Subaru and had an accident so his rates are quite high but we get credit for good driving on his part.
I work in tech, and I am privacy conscious personally so I would never use FB, and I have all google tracking off and manage my app permissions closely.
Regardless of my own personal stance or settings, the argument that "everyone else tracks me so why shouldn't my insurance co!" is not a good one. It's exactly the slippery slope I mentioned. People are becoming more and more numb to losing their privacy.
Even if you're not super concerned about privacy there's a big difference between google periodically polling for your location at the moment to target ads (information it does not sell to others), and your insurance company tracking your every drive (and likely every movement even when not driving since location is on at all times), real time speed, stop, turn and braking events in order to charge you less (or more) based on your driving. This data is such a huge attraction for hackers but also the government. Once this information is saved it can be used at anytime. In 20 years if we go the direction we have been going, why wouldn't the government just ask all the insurance companies for all of their back records, and why wouldn't insurance companies start pooling their information together to create a record of you?
Our legal system was not conceived during a time when there could be perfect monitoring of every person every second of the day, and laws were not expected to have perfect compliance by every human every second of every day. If we were all monitored 24/7 every single person in the US could be charged with a crime; whether it be jay walking, rolling a stop sign, speeding, whatever. That's a scary future that people seem to be ready and willing to head towards for a few bucks off their car insurance policy.
Also, the last point I will add. People are making the argument that it is optional, but it is obviously going the direction of the insurance companies wanting it to be mandatory. They know that they would lose too much business by making it mandatory now so they are coming out with these plans that say "well we won't raise your rate we will only lower it" when we track you. Once enough people are comfortable with that they will transition to making it mandatory. So the argument that "it's optional" is also not a good one.
It's very likely that tracking every second of your drive by an insurance will become mandatory at some point in the future if enough people sign up for these plans.
See the frog placed into boiling water versus heating the water slowly example. Except in this case... you're the frog.
It's very likely that tracking every second of your drive by an insurance will become mandatory at some point in the future if enough people sign up for these plans.
See the frog placed into boiling water versus heating the water slowly example. Except in this case... you're the frog.
