Edit: Just asked because of curiosity. I’m not actually looking for such vehicles.
Edit 2: So for context, my parents new Toyota has this feature that allows the GPS location of the car to be sent to toyota, then you can see the location via an app on android/ios (it’s supposed to be an anti-theft feature). The data is sent via an antenna that connects to cell towers, which then connects to the internet, and to the toyota servers. “Diagnostic” and “maintenance” information is also sent via those same antennas.
The dealer said it could be turned off, but who knows if they are really off. There’s not a hard switch on the car.
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In most legacy manufacturers (e.g, not Tesla) vehicles you can disable/remove the communication module, which is a cell phone modem that interfaces with the car.
For Toyota specifically this is called the DCM (data communication module). It’s a little black box. In Fords/Hondas it’s called a TCU (telematics control module).
In some cases, you can just pull the fuse for the telematics box.
In general, when you research whether you can physically remove this tracking stuff from modern cars, the key word is to use is “telematics”.
I’m afraid it’s going to get much worse. Right now you can at least disable/take out the little box out of most cars without losing functionality for the most part. Soon it’ll be crippling to do so.
Doesn’t really look good:
“All new cars today are privacy nightmares on wheels that collect huge amounts of personal information.”
Hyundai’s privacy policy says, for example, that they can share data with law enforcement and governments based on “formal or informal” requests.
Wow. Informal requests means that someone just has to pretend they’re a LEO and Hyundai might share the information.
Define “privacy” and define “modern car”.
In the end, it doesn’t matter what car you’re driving if you bring your Android/iPhone…
There are “privacy oriented” smartphone replacements. You could flash graphene os to a Pixel.
There is not really such thing for cars.
And, again, what is your definition of “privacy” and what is your definition of “modern car”?
Privacy as in either no telemetry being sent back to the dealer, or the option to turn it off (actually being turned off, not just being set to “off”) The digital aspects of privacy, not car window tint.
Modern car as in a car that’s built within the last 5 years.
Also, I’m not actually looking for a car, just curious.
First, you need to differentiate between “dealer” and “manufacturer”, except in minority cases like Tesla, they are two separate entities.
Dealers, as a rule, don’t have the capacity to accept telemetry data from vehicles. Source: I’m a former dealer sysadmin.
What they can and do do, is download telemetry data stored onboard when you bring the vehicle in for service. This is done through the OBD-II port which has been in every car since 1996.
https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/obd-ii-port-used/
If you’re concerned (or curious) about what data is passed over OBD-II, you can buy your own scanner, $20 to $100 on Amazon depending on features.
Now, MANUFACTURERS, that’s a different deal:
https://www.chicagotribune.com/autos/sc-auto-tips-0102-driving-data-collection-20181225-story.html
For you asking OP twice to specify “privacy” and “modern” (which was very clear what they means, to me at least) your answer is somewhat disappointing now 😁
Telling them that a) dealers don’t have access to telemetry data beyond what’s passed on the vehicle data port and b) providing a news article showing that 3/4 new cars communicate data back to the manufacturers unless you specifically opt out isn’t helpful?
Guessing you didn’t actually read the article?
