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Old 01-14-2025, 12:59 PM   #1
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Gas Buddy is telling insurance companies how you drive?

It looks like your buddy is a tattletale:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/01/allstate-sued-for-allegedly-tracking-drivers-behavior-through-third-party-apps/

That’s a real buddy!
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Old 01-14-2025, 01:11 PM   #2
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When will people realize “free” services on the internet aren’t free, you’re the product being sold.

Facebook
Credit Karma
Instagram
X
Gmail or any google service
MyRadar
LinkedIn
TikTok
Nerdwallet

The list goes on and on and on and on.
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Old 01-14-2025, 01:21 PM   #3
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Any info you give to anyone,banks, grocery, drug store DMV, etc, gets sold to someone.
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Old 01-14-2025, 03:00 PM   #4
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Even the vehicles you drive and tell on you.


Friend has an older dodge pickup and two newer ford pickups. He honestly states his primary vehicle is the dodge, every time he drops by my house he's driving the dodge. A couple years ago he got notice his premium was going up after he took one of the pickups to AK on a trip pulling a trailer. Insurance company said he had driven too many miles in the ford.
Ford has a feature on newer vehicles that allows the vehicle to transmit info such as mileage, my 2020 Transit van has this but I disabled it.
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Old 01-14-2025, 03:06 PM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jacwjames View Post
Even the vehicles you drive and tell on you.


Friend has an older dodge pickup and two newer ford pickups. He honestly states his primary vehicle is the dodge, every time he drops by my house he's driving the dodge. A couple years ago he got notice his premium was going up after he took one of the pickups to AK on a trip pulling a trailer. Insurance company said he had driven too many miles in the ford.
Ford has a feature on newer vehicles that allows the vehicle to transmit info such as mileage, my 2020 Transit van has this but I disabled it.
Does he use an insurance app on his phone. Perhaps the Progressive or State Farm app? They can easily track movement and gps data to raise your rates. Even using the accelerometer to know how hard you hit the brakes or take corners by measuring g-force loads. All these sensors are built right into all these handy devices we carry. And the terms of service when you load those apps pretty much give an open invitation for all metric data to be sent to whatever server they want.
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Old 01-14-2025, 03:22 PM   #6
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How it works (sort of, apps can/will be a little different) -

There is an "advertising ID" that is associated with your mobile phone or SIM-connected device by an app, and for advertising it's like your phone number or address.

What can be detected by an app? Almost any sensor or telemetry data produced or received by your device, so "they" know when your device moves, and your device reports on what other devices and services are around it - the MAC address of your car's Bluetooth system (which also downloads your contact list, text messages, and a bunch of other stuff), any Wifi networks it detects, the advertising IDs of other phones or devices you connect to (various "smart home", smart watch, Internet of Things stuff, etc). Because your phone has GPS and an accelerometer, an app can know where you've been, how fast you're moving and the direction of travel. An app that regularly sends location and velocity info can allow you to be tracked in near-real time. And whatever data an app collects is for sale in real time.

What you can do: use your favorite spyware/search tool and find out how to reset the advertising IDs on your phone. Reset them often. That works while "they" build up a database of advertising IDs associated with your phone. Bah, humbug! You can also set each app's location data use to "only when using the app" and not allowing an app to run in the background (this will break map apps and similar stuff, so you'll probably want to allow them). You can have your phone set to "approximate location" (cell tower signal strength/triangulation) and if you don't need anything location-based, you can turn off the GPS (as far as apps can see it), although it's still available to the operating system.

Final thoughts (I promise) - Chrome is spyware for Google while keeping out some of the other riff-raff. The real reason BigWeb hates ad blockers is that most of them work by blocking the service of tracking cookies and beacons.


Edit ps: among the customers for this data (besides advertisers) are various law enforcement agencies ranging from local to international. Why get a warrant when we can purchase the information from a commercial source? Why spy on people when corporate surveillance is already doing it commercially? It's not just Gas Buddy, it's pretty much all of them.
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Old 01-15-2025, 07:52 AM   #7
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Sometimes, not often, but occasionally, I'll spend a week without leaving the campground area. Maybe one three-mile round trip to the grocery store for fresh produce.

Lots of things to do here, and many friends.

I get a notice from USAA that my 'Drive Safe' app is not working if I don't have a reported trip after five days.
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Old 01-15-2025, 08:22 AM   #8
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Solo_RV_Guy View Post
How it works (sort of, apps can/will be a little different) -

There is an "advertising ID" that is associated with your mobile phone or SIM-connected device by an app, and for advertising it's like your phone number or address.

What can be detected by an app? Almost any sensor or telemetry data produced or received by your device, so "they" know when your device moves, and your device reports on what other devices and services are around it - the MAC address of your car's Bluetooth system (which also downloads your contact list, text messages, and a bunch of other stuff), any Wifi networks it detects, the advertising IDs of other phones or devices you connect to (various "smart home", smart watch, Internet of Things stuff, etc). Because your phone has GPS and an accelerometer, an app can know where you've been, how fast you're moving and the direction of travel. An app that regularly sends location and velocity info can allow you to be tracked in near-real time. And whatever data an app collects is for sale in real time.

What you can do: use your favorite spyware/search tool and find out how to reset the advertising IDs on your phone. Reset them often. That works while "they" build up a database of advertising IDs associated with your phone. Bah, humbug! You can also set each app's location data use to "only when using the app" and not allowing an app to run in the background (this will break map apps and similar stuff, so you'll probably want to allow them). You can have your phone set to "approximate location" (cell tower signal strength/triangulation) and if you don't need anything location-based, you can turn off the GPS (as far as apps can see it), although it's still available to the operating system.

Final thoughts (I promise) - Chrome is spyware for Google while keeping out some of the other riff-raff. The real reason BigWeb hates ad blockers is that most of them work by blocking the service of tracking cookies and beacons.


Edit ps: among the customers for this data (besides advertisers) are various law enforcement agencies ranging from local to international. Why get a warrant when we can purchase the information from a commercial source? Why spy on people when corporate surveillance is already doing it commercially? It's not just Gas Buddy, it's pretty much all of them.
I suggest using DuckDuckGo as your default search engine. It appears to me that it truly helps in keeping companies and government agencies from tracking you.

It takes a while to get used to and also doesn’t utilize the same volume of information on some searches.

And it’s free.
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Old 01-15-2025, 08:28 AM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jacwjames View Post
Even the vehicles you drive and tell on you.


Friend has an older dodge pickup and two newer ford pickups. He honestly states his primary vehicle is the dodge, every time he drops by my house he's driving the dodge. A couple years ago he got notice his premium was going up after he took one of the pickups to AK on a trip pulling a trailer. Insurance company said he had driven too many miles in the ford.
Ford has a feature on newer vehicles that allows the vehicle to transmit info such as mileage, my 2020 Transit van has this but I disabled it.
Some of that information in includes speed, late night driving, hours per day driving, hard braking, avoidance maneuvers etc.
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Old 01-15-2025, 11:08 AM   #10
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Country Road View Post
I suggest using DuckDuckGo as your default search engine. It appears to me that it truly helps in keeping companies and government agencies from tracking you.

It takes a while to get used to and also doesn’t utilize the same volume of information on some searches.

And it’s free.
I do, in fact, use the Duck! Now that G-search has become almost exclusively an advertising delivery mechanism I don't use it any more. I've de-Googled my life and devices to the extent I can.


I don't think a lot of folks realize just how much data their phones generate about their lives. When we have iRV2 users going off about not giving their SSN to a fuel discount service I laugh. With their phone number and about US$20, I can find their location and where their phone has been been for the last 24 hours. I can find out if they've made online purchases, made or received voice calls or SMS messages. For more money I can find out a whole lot more. And that's all from 100% legit (not dark web) sources.


Edit ps: Not trying to swerve this thread but to let folks know that there are more apps selling data about you than just Gas Buddy, and that the only way to not give away your data is to not use about 98% of apps.
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Old 01-15-2025, 11:13 AM   #11
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I agree that the vehicle can track, monitor and possibly report driving habits, but I can't see how Gas Buddy on my phone can do that. About half the time I am in a vehicle I am riding with some one else.
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Old 01-15-2025, 11:28 AM   #12
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Since I don't exceed the speed limit and come to a complete stop at stop signs, maybe this tracking will give me a discount for being a safe driver! LOL.

The expectation there is privacy while we're carry a tracking device more commonly known as a smartphone is laughable indeed.
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Old 01-15-2025, 11:30 AM   #13
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I have been very conscious of BIG BOTHER WATCHING US. I have shut off all of the APPS that track you and monitor your location. I also have turned off the location service in our I-phones. I still get messages from ATT once in a while that they will not be able to locate our phones if it is lost.

My 2008, tuck doesn't have the sophistication as the newer trucks have in the ECM'S and the satellite connections that report where you are and the interface with the manufactures.

I also have not taken advantage any of the reporting device that are offered by the insurance companies to lower your driving cost. Do they really lower the cost?

My wife's car a 2021, HYUNDAI had the BLUELINK app factory installed. I read the owner's manual and figured out how to turn this feature off. First time I went in for the yearly service requirement the dealer service adviser informed that the APP was not working. He wanted to turn the app back on so the dealer and Hyundai could monitor the car. I told him I wanted the app off and they could not monitor the vehicle health or mileage. I would bring the vehicle in yearly for service work as required for warranty coverage, but no Bluelink app would be turned on.
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Old 01-15-2025, 11:32 AM   #14
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Like all apps, it is up to you to decide what info is shared. For gasbuddy, I only share info if the app is open.

That is my standard configuration. And only share the data you want it to see. Some apps don't like that, so then it is up to you to decide if the benefit is worth it.

Also, don't stay logged in.
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