I get the point about government access and agree it's a sad state of affairs.

The difference is Tesla has a lot to lose if they can't demonstrate adequate consumer protection of the data from theft/unauthorized access - and significant consequences if a breach does occur. They should also have high quality engineering talent to make sure exploits don't occur.

A small startup doesn't have the same burdon on penalty for breach and probably far lower quality of eng talent.

This is why I reluctantly concede to Google and Tesla tracking my location, but not random startups.