GM Settled With The FTC After It Sold Your Data

General Motors has reached a settlement agreement with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over allegations the company sold location and driver behavior data via its Smart Driver app without user consent. At first, GM told The New York Times it placed responsibility for shared data with drivers. Then, it told Edmunds the program was no longer sharing data with brokers LexisNexis and Verisk before shutting down Smart Driver a few weeks later. Now, the company’s agreement with the FTC shapes what is the first federal action taken on data harvested from connected cars.

GM Sold Consumer Data It Never Should Have Had Access To

GM’s punishment prevents it from sharing sensitive consumer data for five years. “GM failed to clearly disclose that it collected consumers’ precise geolocation and driving behavior data and sold it to third parties, including consumer reporting agencies, without consumers’ consent,” said the FTC.

GM’s Smart Driver app provided users with detailed information on their trips, recording information like hard stops, acceleration, location data, and more. This information eventually made its way to insurers via brokers like Verisk and LexisNexis, per the NYT‘s investigation:

General Motors Falls On Its Sword

“Respecting our customers’ privacy and earning their trust is deeply important to us. Although Smart Driver was created to promote safer driving behavior, we ended that program due to customer feedback,” reads GM’s statement on the FTC ruling. The company’s brief statement focuses on how it is now being more ethical about its use of consumer data, citing its discontinuation of Smart Driver.

The company also says it will now obtain “affirmative customer consent to collect, use, or disclose certain types of connected vehicle data (with exceptions for certain purposes).” It doesn’t specify what these purposes are, though this part of the agreement lasts for 20 years.

TopSpeed’s Take

The FTC settlement agreement is a slap on the wrist. Per the FTC’s press release, “General Motors LLC, General Motors Holdings LLC, and OnStar LLC, which are owned by General Motors Company, will be banned for five years from disclosing consumers’ sensitive geolocation and driver behavior data to consumer reporting agencies.” Other stipulations include taking “other steps to provide greater transparency and choice to consumers over the collection, use, and disclosure of their connected vehicle data.”

The FTC says this is its first action related to connected vehicle data, and it is in all seriousness a step in the right direction. However, a five-year ban on something GM shouldn’t be doing in the first place is a weak first effort. It bodes ill for consumers hoping for meaningful privacy protection against companies both within and outside the automotive industry. Consumers can access and delete their personal information via GM’s US Consumer Privacy Request Form or call 1-866-MYPRIVACY (1-866-697-7482).