Good grief, yes to this. One of my many concerns with EVs is the insistence of automakers to stuff these with surveillance tech. I suspect it's so that Tesla, GM, et al can sell data to marketers.
Someone should build an insurance company for Teslas. Build it as a Tesla app connected to the log data. No need for creepy trackers, they're already built in ;)
I think this is fantastic, especially given that I had recently purchased some Tesla stock. However, I wonder, is anyone perturbed that Tesla has the ability to monitor all of this? I know that other car manufacturers are getting closer and closer to this kind of thing. But is anyone else perturbed? I know there must be precedents set already because of technologies like OnStar. What is needed for the police or a court of law to be able to demand this type of data from Tesla or the vehicle owner (not sure where the logs are kept, in the car or in the cloud).
I'm pretty sure they have been open about this. At least I remember reading this somewhere on their website. I think it was part of their 'product testing' program or something, where you would allow Tesla to track everything to gather data for their purposes to make the car better.
Tesla has no hardware for proper driver monitoring. Most of model S have no internal camera. And model 3 internal camera wasn’t designed for it (doesn’t work in the dark, cannot see through sunglasses, cannot see where your eyes are actually pointing, etc).
You cannot OTA HW deficiencies.
Now, will they be forced to have monitoring like that, to be on par with their competitors? That’s a different story, and given how weak USA regulatory agencies are, and how reckless Tesla is at disregarding them - I’m pretty sure Tesla won’t be hurt by it.
Tesla know this. Don't forget that every car they make records telemetry and tests new algorithms. It would be great to see Elon stomping around stage like Ballmer: "data, data, data, data, data, data, data!"
That's a brilliant idea, and I think I might be well-positioned to offer it.
Not with Teslas specifically; I think surveillance is woven so deep into the fabric of the vehicle, it'd be a lot of work to get it out. But with most other makes, it's just a telematics unit that's easy enough to remove or bypass, and most of the other functionality just keeps working.
How would one price such a service? Often the research is 99% of the work, and the actual labor is just pulling a connector or two, perhaps fabricating a short bypass harness.
If not, that is really, really dumb, and there is no way to justify not doing that. Especially for car that probably has more sensors, electronics and software than most cars (that also provide such info).
I would like to see Tesla's response to this. I was going to pre-order a model X, i won't be now, until I know I won't be tracked and the car won't brick itself.
Seems like if this was in a Tesla, evidence one way or the other should be pretty easy to obtain no? Upside/Downside of a car that conducts nonstop surveillance.
Side point: why are regulators letting Tesla owners install beta self-driving software? And why are Tesla allowed to ship it to them? Seems stupidly risky.
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