privacy. and security.

[photontorque]

If you think Apple is owned by Mother Teresa, you are wrong.

My perspective is that there has been huge Overreach by TecH companiEs in Regards To collEcting and monetizing peRsonal data, without transparEncy to conSumers About what infOrmation is collected Without coNSent, and how companies are making money on that data. Creepy, but evidently not (yet) illegal.

Apple is setting a nice precedent with their privacy policy, to the extent that I understand it. But I still think there's room for improvement, such as the ability to opt out of all data collection.

Great scott! I did say Mother Teresa owns Apple, just in a distributed fashion. Impressively careful reading of the text there! Sorry for the confusion, that’s not what I meant. Rather, I meant that Apple is moving in the right direction, and I’d rather reward them for that, and encourage other businesses to move in that direction. As opposed to, e.g., Facebook.

Might be unpopular but the only way in our current capitalist society to stop a company from using your data in a way you don’t like is to not use their products and services.
Corporations in general don’t have a conscience or morality. It’s about the dollar. I’m not saying that’s bad per se but I don’t look to them for those competencies.
There are those companies who will do it well IMO and those who wont.
I don’t love it, but I really don’t have anything to hide. The only way to balance it is with government regulation in my book. We can vote and attempt to influence the government, corporations just have to follow the law and even then they often have the $$$$ to avoid that.

I am not going to take this any farther as I am dangerously close to politics here.

I agree that rivian should make as clear a statement as possible and then we decide with our wallets. The benefits of data analysis and cloud infrastructure outweigh the risks for ME by leaps and bounds. But nothing is free.

A great quote from the movie The Social Dilemma was “if you are not paying for the product, then YOU are the product.”

Just because someone, or a company, can do something doesn’t mean they should. I also agree that there needs to be an external forcing function to clearly incentivize the kind of data companies do or do NOT collect, and how that data gets treated. As @JeremyMKE said, because that starts down the road to politics, I’ll leave it there.

The forcing function I can use right now is to communicate my preferences to Rivian, and depending on what information they provide on these topics, choose not buy their product, and encourage others also to not buy the product if they feel the same way I do.

I potentially am buying a RIvian, and paying a pretty penny for it. Rivian is getting a lot of my hard-earned cash, and doesn't need a pound of a different kind of flesh from me. The warning from @Gshenderson is right on target: I am not a product.

My cellphone is a serious threat to my privacy, my cars, bikes, and trucks are not in the same ballpark.

While I have not been the victim of identity theft, I know people who have, and it has hugely negative effects on their life, sometimes for years. Cars are not cells phones, but the same potential is there, especially with vehicles like a Rivian: they can record where you’ve been, where you are, what kind of driving you’ve done, listen to everything you say in the car, and even TAKE PICTURES OF YOU the entire time. For reference, my current car has a (TOTALLY RAD) tape deck, original to purchase!, so getting a Rivan will be a huge leap in terms of technology that is native to the vehicle I drive. If you’re comfortable with Rivian downloading all that data and using it however they wish, cool! More power to you and Rivian. But, as a matter of principal, I do not want Rivian to have that data to with whatever they wish.

Maybe Rivian won't do anything with data but use it to improve their product, but other ne'er-do-well individuals could hack Rivian systems, ala the story about the Facebook hack above.

Again, if you're ok with arbitrarily detailed data collection, that's great! But others, like me, are not, and as consumers we should have the option to opt out. If there are certain fundamental performance parameters Rivian wants to collect, then they should let the consumer know they are collecting that information, and anonymize the data.

And thanks to all for the dialogue on this topic, I know we all have different perspectives, and it's great to discuss this in a civilized fashion.

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[Gshenderson]

Great scott! I did say Mother Teresa owns Apple, just in a distributed fashion. Impressively careful reading of the text there! Sorry for the confusion, that’s not what I meant. Rather, I meant that Apple is moving in the right direction, and I’d rather reward them for that, and encourage other businesses to move in that direction. As opposed to, e.g., Facebook.






Just because someone, or a company, can do something doesn’t mean they should. I also agree that there needs to be an external forcing function to clearly incentivize the kind of data companies do or do NOT collect, and how that data gets treated. As @JeremyMKE said, because that starts down the road to politics, I’ll leave it there.

The forcing function I can use right now is to communicate my preferences to Rivian, and depending on what information they provide on these topics, choose not buy their product, and encourage others also to not buy the product if they feel the same way I do.

I potentially am buying a RIvian, and paying a pretty penny for it. Rivian is getting a lot of my hard-earned cash, and doesn't need a pound of a different kind of flesh from me. The warning from @Gshenderson is right on target: I am not a product.



While I have not been the victim of identity theft, I know people who have, and it has hugely negative effects on their life, sometimes for years. Cars are not cells phones, but the same potential is there, especially with vehicles like a Rivian: they can record where you’ve been, where you are, what kind of driving you’ve done, listen to everything you say in the car, and even TAKE PICTURES OF YOU the entire time. For reference, my current car has a (TOTALLY RAD) tape deck, original to purchase!, so getting a Rivan will be a huge leap in terms of technology that is native to the vehicle I drive. If you’re comfortable with Rivian downloading all that data and using it however they wish, cool! More power to you and Rivian. But, as a matter of principal, I do not want Rivian to have that data to with whatever they wish.

Maybe Rivian won't do anything with data but use it to improve their product, but other ne'er-do-well individuals could hack Rivian systems, ala the story about the Facebook hack above.

Again, if you're ok with arbitrarily detailed data collection, that's great! But others, like me, are not, and as consumers we should have the option to opt out. If there are certain fundamental performance parameters Rivian wants to collect, then they should let the consumer know they are collecting that information, and anonymize the data.

And thanks to all for the dialogue on this topic, I know we all have different perspectives, and it's great to discuss this in a civilized fashion.

Look into GDPR standards in Europe. Step in the right direction, but not perfect. Just like HIPPA here. It’s an evolving issue and one where the regulations will always lag the tech. I’ve been in the data analytics business for over 30 years. It’s not all bad. But just like any tech, it’s whether it’s used for good or evil. #data4good.

 

[SANZC02]

Look into GDPR standards in Europe. Step in the right direction, but not perfect. Just like HIPPA here. It’s an evolving issue and one where the regulations will always lag the tech. I’ve been in the data analytics business for over 30 years. It’s not all bad. But just like any tech, it’s whether it’s used for good or evil. #data4good.

Now that Rivian has their headquarters in CA they may lean more towards the CA Data Privacy laws that have some very similar items to GDPR.

 

[skyote]

Now that Rivian has their headquarters in CA they may lean more towards the CA Data Privacy laws that have some very similar items to GDPR.

CCPA does cover personal info including geolocation. Rivian will definitely have plenty of customers in CA, and it's often easiest for companies to apply the most stringent standard across the customer base. We also know that Rivian is targeting Europe in the near future, so GDPR will be in play as well.

Hopefully this will be positive for customer privacy, but I still want to know what they'll be collecting & for what purposes.

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