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The British publication The Sun, a tabloid sometimes terrifying and sometimes entertaining, reports the anxiety of human rights groups, former ministers and some legal experts on Mercedes-Benz that uses vehicle location data to locate faulty customers. their financial program payments.
To be clear, the written conditions of the financial agreement between Mercedes-Benz and the United Kingdom on vehicle loans clearly indicate in bold how the builder can use the location data to search for a vehicle when the owner infringes their financial agreement. But apparently this is not enough, and the rare cases where the car manufacturer would get hold of people would be enough to annoy some people and stir up fears of too much surveillance and embarrassment caused by companies in life people.
From the sun:
Former Cabinet Minister David Davis today called on the government to investigate.
He added, "This is not the first time big business has behaved like Big Brother – but it is rare that they are so misleading.
"I have to ask myself if it is even legal to transmit information to other people, such as bailiffs.
"I think the competent minister should take a very close look at the legality of this procedure."
The human rights group Liberty said Mercedes' actions were worrisome and part of the "growing development of surveillance".
Legal experts have also raised concerns. Stefano Ruis, a civil law partner at Hickman & Rose's law firm, said: "This seems to be another worrying development in the way companies manage what should be personal and private data.
"Modern technology means that our ability to keep personal information private is threatened like never before.
"Organizations that manage personal data must be fully aware of what they are doing. This Mercedes seems not to have been in this case is worrying. His clients can then begin to worry about other personal information that the company might collect and then pass on. "
A spokesman for Mercedes-Benz sent Jalopnik the following reply to Sun's article:
We do not use tracking device.
Connectivity services are an essential part of modern cars. They increase safety and comfort. Location-based services are part of this connectivity, for example to provide traffic services or to locate a car in case of emergency.
As a rule, Mercedes-Benz does not follow the drivers.
We place great importance on the responsible and transparent use of customer data. The customer determines what services he wants to use and what data he wants to transmit – either by consent, by contract or simply by pressing a button. We also inform our customers of the so-called repossession process when they apply for financing from Mercedes-Benz Financial Services. In this case, they sign a contract and accept the use of the car's website in case of default or violation of their financing contract.
This process of repossession is used in exceptional cases and only as a last resort, when the customers fail to fulfill their obligations or violate their financing contract and fail repeatedly in their requests for restitution of their vehicle. We also want to emphasize that this does not mean constant monitoring.
According to the Sun, about 80% of the company's sales in the UK include a financial services plan, which probably makes Mercedes a little nervous about taking care of a series of cars that are going inevitably come back to them.
On the one hand, the technical details show that Mercedes-Benz has done nothing wrong in law. Although it is illegal in the European Union to track a vehicle without the driver's knowledge, in theory anyone who signed the financing agreement knowingly waived his right to be located . If they do not make their payments, well, it makes sense that Mercedes no longer wants to continue lending them the car.
But at the same time, it's a bit painful to know that someone can always find your car at any time. We are all afraid of being accused by mistake of something we have not done, or sometimes the money gets a little tight and it is difficult to make a single payment or two. It may not be as easy for a company to be able to track and punish customers with minimal supervision from another party.
And of course, more often than not, this type of technology has an exponentially larger impact on the poorest individuals. Do not forget that in Europe, many Mercedes models are sleek models, more affordable versions of the cars we sell here and not all the luxury giants. A sudden loss of employment and a tough job market could result in someone in a vicious cycle of misfortune, especially once you have removed his car.
Already invasive technologies are installed on cars to lock drivers in case of non-payment. Even that remains a safer approach to ensuring payment, without having to screen anyone and remove his vehicle. But for those who are really trying to make ends meet, losing their car in the middle of a job hunt would be catastrophic.
These are all ethical questions about modern technology that we probably would have had to solve when Web connectivity really started to take off, but we are all now caught up in our own network of devices that constantly poke every move.
At the moment, we trust Mercedes-Benz to control what it does with customer data itself, and for now, it claims to serve only on an extremely limited basis. But if the contract is already signed and Mercedes changes and decides to sell this data to someone else, how are we going to know? And then what can we do about it?
Just do your best to make your payments, I guess. And do not rent a Mercedes if you run a high risk of repossession. I am personally reassured to know that no matter where I go, someone can probably find me. And if I lost myself?
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