Mercedes-Benz owners can track their cars through the Mercedes Me app. Tesla owners can track their cars through a similar app. The apps provide convenient ways for parents to keep tabs on teen drivers. They can remind owners where they parked and even let the police department track a stolen vehicle.
For Christine Dowdall, however, the tracking function in her Mercedes-Benz C-Class was a safety risk. After she left her abusive husband, The New York Times reports, he tracked her location through the app. He used the knowledge to harass her and the people who provided her sanctuary.
Reuters tells a similar story in a new report, examining how an abuser used Tesla’s built-in tracking capability to follow and harass his wife after she took out a restraining order against him.
“Technology-Enabled Stalking” A New Worry
“Cases of technology-enabled stalking involving cars are emerging as automakers add ever-more-sophisticated features, such as location tracking and remote control of functions such as locking doors or honking the horn,” Reuters reported after conducting interviews with divorce lawyers, private investigators, and anti-domestic-violence advocates.
Many of today’s cars maintain permanent connections to the internet. These enable automakers to provide remote software updates that fix safety problems and add new conveniences. But they also introduce new safety risks — risks the auto industry has barely begun to address.
Cars Are a Privacy Nightmare, Researchers Say
Last year, privacy researchers from the non-profit Mozilla Foundation found cars “the official worst category of products [they had] ever reviewed.” In their terms and conditions, automakers reserve the right to collect information on everything from driving habits to “sexual activity.” We’re not making that last one up — Mozilla Foundation researchers found that clause in a Nissan user agreement.
But they’re not the only ones using the data. The New York Times reports, “Domestic violence experts say that these convenience features are being weaponized in abusive relationships, and that car makers have not been willing to assist victims.”
Problem More Complex When Drivers Aren’t Owners
The issue grows particularly complicated when those alleging abuse are co-owners of the car.
Mercedes told the Bossier Parish Sheriff’s Office it couldn’t block Dowdall’s husband from accessing the car’s information because he was listed on the title.
The automotive industry is just beginning to grapple with the issue. Reuters notes the Alliance for Automotive Innovation — the trade group that represents most automakers to federal and state governments — asked California not to require them to release personal data on request because of the potential for domestic violence. The group “argued some car owners might improperly request personal data on other drivers of the same vehicle,” Reuters explains.
Through its OnStar service, General Motors lets drivers choose to mask their location. Rivian told Reuters it is working on similar technology.
But it may take legislative action to solve the problem. Adam Dodge, a family law attorney and digital safety expert, told the Times that a federal law known as the Safe Connections Act allows abuse victims to separate their phone accounts from those of their abusers. ” A similar law should extend to cars,” Dodge told the Times, “allowing people with protective orders from a court to easily cut off an abuser’s digital access to their car.”
