Yet another Hacker News

Car is a smartphone on wheels. Here's who's listening

49 points longhaul 39 minutes ago 17 comments

AndrewKemendo 30 minutes ago | parent

I’ve been constantly telling everyone I know about this since the patriot act was signed and basically 100% of people don’t care in my experience

They just want to be able to connect their phone and have their music/video available and think that because they are “not doing anything wrong” they don’t “have anything to fear”

I’m glad this site exists so I can just send it to people directly

moffkalast 25 minutes ago | parent

Well, just the fact that you don't pay for the monthly cellular subscription these cars use should tell you all you need to know about who's the product in this situation.

longhaul 23 minutes ago | parent

There are no specific opt outs. Either you allow everything or navigation doesn’t work etc.

jeffbee 14 minutes ago | parent

Why rely on your car's built-in software for navigation? Smartphone navigation is going to be a lot better (in my experience) and Google, Apple privacy terms are greatly superior.

longhaul 7 minutes ago | parent

Navigation is one example. There are music/front/rear cameras/controls/others. Not all controls have physical buttons.

zenapollo 18 minutes ago | parent

The world IS getting mass surveillance. The havens for privacy are shrinking. We are becoming the ants in the ant farm.

One thing i don’t understand is how pro-surveillance advocates don’t understand that the moment they are not behind the terminal, they are the target.

mistrial9 7 minutes ago | parent

uniformed services and some kinds of professionals already have agreed to terms on conduct and records. The people who agree to that say "of course" when it comes time to subscribe Everyone Else to the same constraints. That is my own thinking, it might cover some proportion of the cases there...

mancerayder 6 minutes ago | parent

I've never met anyone who's 'pro surveillance'. I've met ad tech executives and Googlers, though. Have you spoken to them about the world that's been built?

hoppyhoppy2 17 minutes ago | parent

Discussed 2 days ago at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49926628

atmavatar 15 minutes ago | parent

The unfortunate reality is we can expect more and more of our goods to spy on us over time, as there are both political and economic motivations to track and collect as much data as possible on everyone.

The best thing you can do is avoid products with trackers while they haven't taken over their entire market, learn to disable GPS, wireless, and cellular antennae once they do, and pray manufacturers take a while to insert dead-man switches as well.

mistrial9 9 minutes ago | parent

> we can expect more and more of our goods to spy on us

strong disagree, this is complicit and defeatist nonsense given +100 years of active and successful consumer rights protection in lawful markets in the West.

indymike 13 minutes ago | parent

I'd like to have a radio kill switch be required on all devices. The reason is that eventually, things that emit RF energy could be targeted by drones. That scares me.

mancerayder 8 minutes ago | parent

You envisage a world where drones are flying around shooting at cars and you're more scared about being targeted yourself than such a world?

recursivedoubts 5 minutes ago | parent

It has been demonstrated repeatedly that modern cars can be remotely hijacked and controlled as well. We really do live in a dystopia.