5 ms·

The problem I find with this is that it doesn't track everything that defines safe driving, and could incorrectly identify what is safe. For example, is drivin

The problem I find with this is that it doesn't track everything that defines safe driving, and could incorrectly identify what is safe. For example, is driving more aggressively more dangerous than texting (or simply not being attentive to the road)? Because only the former is tracked.

randlet 11y ago
It is trivially easy to game too in some cases. My insurer wants to use your smart phone to do the tracking over a period of 6 months after which you no longer have to be tracked. Want to do some street racing every weekend? Just leave your phone at home and go wild. Drive gently on your commute every day until the 6 month period is up and then resume driving like a maniac.
- bdavisx 11y ago
  And when they check your cars mileage and it has a boatload more than your phone recorded? After you signed something that agrees you'll always (or almost always) have your phone with you?
  - randlet 11y ago
    My insurance company has no idea what the mileage is on my vehicles (they've never asked)...maybe they would require that info before tracking you? I don't know. A few thousand miles discrepancy should be very easy to explain away though.
    - rconti 11y ago
      My insurance company has had a 3rd party auditor "audit" my data every effing 6 months for about 3 years straight. I think they're REALLY suspicious that I only put 3000 miles on this vehicle or 2000 miles on that. I've taken to just pulling up my fuel fillup tracker app every time they call. "Oh, did I say 3000 miles? No, actually, let's say 2853 miles". Joke's on them, the per-vehicle mileage goes down every time they ask.
  - sandworm101 11y ago
    If they are tracking via phone, it sounds like they are more interested in the person than the vehicle. So the extra miles could be assumed to be done by other drivers. If they track the phone, how can they tell if you are driving or just a passenger?
    - sliverstorm 11y ago
      I'm not familiar with the exact device, but strongly suspect the cell phone simply serves as the internet link. Early car trackers had integrated cellular radios, but that can't be cheap.
      - gambiting 11y ago
        >> Early car trackers had integrated cellular radios, but that can't be cheap My TomTom 5000 SatNav, which I bought for like $200 has a permanent connection to the internet in all countries of the world with no monthly fee. It has an integrated SIM card and TomTom just paid some fee so that it can connect to the internet and get traffic updates wherever I am in the world. An even cheaper Kindle 3G also had that. So I guess it must be relatively cheap.
        sliverstorm 11y ago
        Obviously not earth-shatteringly expensive, no, but the tracker devices are issued for free, not $200.
        gambiting 11y ago
        Well, my ISP provided me with a very fancy fibreoptic router and a TV box with a terabyte hardrive which I am pretty sure cost them pretty penny yet I haven't paid anything for either of those things. They make money off me every month though, just like an insurance company would - they give you a fancy box for "free" and make money off you selling you their service.
- tejaswiy 11y ago
  I thought you needed hardware you connect to the automobile to do the tracking? My understanding was that the phone and the hardware sync using bluetooth, and the phone uploads data to the insurance companies. Kind of like Automatic: https://www.automatic.com/home/ https://www.automatic.com/home/ This is how they track the hard accels, hard breaks etc., since the car puts these events on it's BUS.
maxerickson 11y ago
I would think a lot of inattentive driving would actually show up on the tracker (abrupt stops, swerves). I guess inattentive driving would also result in higher accident rates than attentive driving (which they obviously track). This is certainly another reason to motivate people to think about what sorts of rules and regulations they want in place regarding data collection and retention.
- jacquesm 11y ago
  > I would think a lot of inattentive driving would actually show up on the tracker (abrupt stops, swerves). Those could just as well be samples of very attentive driving. You know, the ones where you didn't hit the tourist stepping backwards off the curb into traffic and the one where you avoided the toddler that suddenly appeared between two parked cars (just two samples from my driving career). I'd be more wary of people that never have such items while they drive than the ones that do. Circumstances are everything when it comes to making decisions like these.
  - maxerickson 11y ago
    I think it might be easy. I don't know what the real rates are, but you are suggesting something like 1 adverse event per 10,000 miles (or an even lower rate than that, whatever), to the extent that it is interesting to even bother tracking, I would expect inattentive driving to have a much higher incident rate than that.
    - jacquesm 11y ago
      Much lower than that, probably more like 1 per 50K or so. But they do happen and depending on where you live they happen a lot more frequently (Romania, for example, where driving is a bit like a video game but you only get one life. (And for pedestrians it is like 'frogger', and they also only get one life.)
    - vageli 11y ago
      >1 adverse event per 10,000 miles This would not be the case in a place like New York City.
techdmn 11y ago
I came here to say this as well. I admit it, I like to drive hard on occasion. But does the fact that I know the limits of my car's abilities make me a more dangerous driver? Maybe. But I could also cruise ever so gently through a red light, mow down pedestrians at 10 mph under the limit, or smoothly swing wide across the center line into oncoming traffic. Are we tracking things that make dangerous drivers, or tracking things that are easy to track?
- criddell 11y ago
  > But does the fact that I know the limits of my car's abilities make me a more dangerous driver? Perhaps. Devices like this might tell them if people that occasionally drive hard are more likely file a claim. > Are we tracking things that make dangerous drivers, or tracking things that are easy to track? I'm guessing they will track everything they can reasonably track and the set of things they can track will increase over time.

randlet 11y ago

It is trivially easy to game too in some cases. My insurer wants to use your smart phone to do the tracking over a period of 6 months after which you no longer have to be tracked. Want to do some street racing every weekend? Just leave your phone at home and go wild. Drive gently on your commute every day until the 6 month period is up and then resume driving like a maniac.

bdavisx 11y ago
And when they check your cars mileage and it has a boatload more than your phone recorded? After you signed something that agrees you'll always (or almost always) have your phone with you?
- randlet 11y ago
  My insurance company has no idea what the mileage is on my vehicles (they've never asked)...maybe they would require that info before tracking you? I don't know. A few thousand miles discrepancy should be very easy to explain away though.
  - rconti 11y ago
    My insurance company has had a 3rd party auditor "audit" my data every effing 6 months for about 3 years straight. I think they're REALLY suspicious that I only put 3000 miles on this vehicle or 2000 miles on that. I've taken to just pulling up my fuel fillup tracker app every time they call. "Oh, did I say 3000 miles? No, actually, let's say 2853 miles". Joke's on them, the per-vehicle mileage goes down every time they ask.
- sandworm101 11y ago
  If they are tracking via phone, it sounds like they are more interested in the person than the vehicle. So the extra miles could be assumed to be done by other drivers. If they track the phone, how can they tell if you are driving or just a passenger?
  - sliverstorm 11y ago
    I'm not familiar with the exact device, but strongly suspect the cell phone simply serves as the internet link. Early car trackers had integrated cellular radios, but that can't be cheap.
    - gambiting 11y ago
      >> Early car trackers had integrated cellular radios, but that can't be cheap My TomTom 5000 SatNav, which I bought for like $200 has a permanent connection to the internet in all countries of the world with no monthly fee. It has an integrated SIM card and TomTom just paid some fee so that it can connect to the internet and get traffic updates wherever I am in the world. An even cheaper Kindle 3G also had that. So I guess it must be relatively cheap.
      - sliverstorm 11y ago
        Obviously not earth-shatteringly expensive, no, but the tracker devices are issued for free, not $200.
        gambiting 11y ago
        Well, my ISP provided me with a very fancy fibreoptic router and a TV box with a terabyte hardrive which I am pretty sure cost them pretty penny yet I haven't paid anything for either of those things. They make money off me every month though, just like an insurance company would - they give you a fancy box for "free" and make money off you selling you their service.
tejaswiy 11y ago
I thought you needed hardware you connect to the automobile to do the tracking? My understanding was that the phone and the hardware sync using bluetooth, and the phone uploads data to the insurance companies. Kind of like Automatic: https://www.automatic.com/home/ https://www.automatic.com/home/ This is how they track the hard accels, hard breaks etc., since the car puts these events on it's BUS.

maxerickson 11y ago

I would think a lot of inattentive driving would actually show up on the tracker (abrupt stops, swerves). I guess inattentive driving would also result in higher accident rates than attentive driving (which they obviously track). This is certainly another reason to motivate people to think about what sorts of rules and regulations they want in place regarding data collection and retention.

jacquesm 11y ago
> I would think a lot of inattentive driving would actually show up on the tracker (abrupt stops, swerves). Those could just as well be samples of very attentive driving. You know, the ones where you didn't hit the tourist stepping backwards off the curb into traffic and the one where you avoided the toddler that suddenly appeared between two parked cars (just two samples from my driving career). I'd be more wary of people that never have such items while they drive than the ones that do. Circumstances are everything when it comes to making decisions like these.
- maxerickson 11y ago
  I think it might be easy. I don't know what the real rates are, but you are suggesting something like 1 adverse event per 10,000 miles (or an even lower rate than that, whatever), to the extent that it is interesting to even bother tracking, I would expect inattentive driving to have a much higher incident rate than that.
  - jacquesm 11y ago
    Much lower than that, probably more like 1 per 50K or so. But they do happen and depending on where you live they happen a lot more frequently (Romania, for example, where driving is a bit like a video game but you only get one life. (And for pedestrians it is like 'frogger', and they also only get one life.)
  - vageli 11y ago
    >1 adverse event per 10,000 miles This would not be the case in a place like New York City.

techdmn 11y ago

I came here to say this as well. I admit it, I like to drive hard on occasion. But does the fact that I know the limits of my car's abilities make me a more dangerous driver? Maybe. But I could also cruise ever so gently through a red light, mow down pedestrians at 10 mph under the limit, or smoothly swing wide across the center line into oncoming traffic. Are we tracking things that make dangerous drivers, or tracking things that are easy to track?

criddell 11y ago
> But does the fact that I know the limits of my car's abilities make me a more dangerous driver? Perhaps. Devices like this might tell them if people that occasionally drive hard are more likely file a claim. > Are we tracking things that make dangerous drivers, or tracking things that are easy to track? I'm guessing they will track everything they can reasonably track and the set of things they can track will increase over time.