It would make sense to anonymise the data before sending it to the government and the point of the data is to identify road congestion and problematic junctions. It could also feed into better tracking of traffic lights timings etc. None of those uses have a requirement to know whether it's Mr Jones in his red Corsa or Mrs Malaprop in her SUV.
And for bonus points (pun not intended) will suspend your insurance because they think you're speeding even when you're not [0], with not a lot of recourse.
Driving without insurance could get you a £300 fine and 6 points on your license - enough to cancel it in one go if qualified less than 2 years, which is usually the target audience of these boxes.
> Sterling Insurance made Angela and her son go to the locations of his alleged speeding infractions and take pictures of the road signs next to a digital map on a phone.
Yeah, just show them that their data is wrong - no big deal right? I guess in an ideal world such litigation would happen cheaply and quickly too.
Certainly, if you get into legal trouble for not having valid insurance, you could easily demonstrate the facts as to why the company illegally revoked your insurance and how they had no right to do so.
Fleet cars tend to have these systems, as do trucks. I have a friend that drives 18-wheelers, and often complains about getting nagged by Safety, when he does something out of bounds, or, more often, when drivers around him drive out of bounds.
It’s definitely an insurance thing, with his company. They probably save millions per year, using that system. I explained to him that’s why they’ll never make an “exception” for him, because he’s skilled and experienced. The system is there for all the low-rent knuckleheads they hire.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/apr/28/tomtom-sa...
This already exists, at least in the UK market. A lot of insurers will give you a discount if you let them fit such a "telematics" box to your car. It's still a privacy nightmare.