Court rules automakers can record and intercept owner text messages
https://therecord.media/class-action-lawsuit-cars-text-messages-privacyOpen linkView original on lemmy.world157
Comments21https://therecord.media/class-action-lawsuit-cars-text-messages-privacyOpen linkView original on lemmy.world
wow, ok. fuck privacy when it comes to cash, right?
Sounds like the states privacy laws might be dogshit...
Its damn hard to prove injury without discovery...
Judges are supposed to rule based on what the law says, not what they think is a good idea. Most likely the law is just inadequate.
You would lose that bet. David G. Estudillo was appointed to the state judiciary by Gov. Jay Inslee and then to the federal judiciary by Biden.
However, the article misrepresented the ruling. The actual decision (my emphasis) was:
An injury is more than a threat, it's an actual monetary loss. To show an injury, you need to "bring the receipts" as it were. In this case, the plaintiff did not formally state their injury.
So we don't have privacy as individuals because it doesn't hurt our bank account, but of course that means all businesses get their right to privacy because reason$.
Cool.
It's a state law, so if you live in Washington state then you have to show actual damages to win a lawsuit. It should be easy to do so if (for example) a privacy breach led to identity theft. And this requirement applies to both individuals and businesses.
If you live in another state, YMMV. Maybe you have more right to privacy, maybe less.
Basically the judge said the plaintiff could not show any harm done to them. Someone who has been arrested based on this could definitely sue and get it stopped.
"His or her person has been threatened" implies physical harm. Sounds dumb or corrupt for privacy legislation, but unless the car companies were using the data to conduct identity theft, it wouldn't be considered a direct threat. Obviously we know them storing the data at all is a threat, even without the data brokers, but the law is shit... and judges are usually technologically illiterate rich kids anyway.
God this place is a cesspool. How do armchair lawyers get upvoted like this?
Privacy is becoming a luxury
You want privacy, pay us, and we'll still collect and save the data tho.
Why are cars even getting text messages in the first place?
The idea is the car reads your texts to you via TTS so it's less tempting to look at your phone while driving.
Oh wow that’s fucked that cars can monitor that now
Only if you give the car permission. My phone (Android) has a popup when I connect to a car, asking if I want to give permission to read my text messages. I usually answer no.
No doubt iPhones have something similar.
I wonder if this interacts with Android Auto. AA essentially uses your car's speakers and screen as peripherals for your phone, so hopefully it's sandboxed out of the car's systems (except then it's Google reading your messages).
I just turn the phone on silent. In fact silent is the default mode. To many spammers. There is nothing important enough in my life that requires immediate attention. Might change if I find a woman and get kids but not likely.
...just don't link it?
I'll bet this is not as cut and dry as the headline makes it sound.
It sucks but the easiest thing to do is to never enable your phone to connect to any of the car USB ports and/or their Bluetooth data service. Also find out were your car connects to voice speaker and remove the fuse from it or if you want to just cut the cable off completely.