Thanks to onboard navigation systems, automakers can keep track your vehicle's locations for varying lengths of time. Owners cannot currently request that information be destroyed.
Detroit News: The Government Accountability Office in a report released Monday found major automakers have differing policies about how much data they collect and how long they keep it.
Automakers collect location data in order to provide drivers with real-time traffic information, to help find the nearest gas station or restaurant, and to provide emergency roadside assistance and stolen vehicle tracking. But, the report found, “If companies retained data, they did not allow consumers to request that their data be deleted, which is a recommended practice.”
Sen. Al Franken (D-MN), who chairs a Senate subcommittee on privacy, technology, and the law, wants a new law designed to protect vehicle owner privacy.
Franken's bill, dubbed the Location Privacy Act, won bipartisan support from the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2012 but stalled in the previous Congress. He hopes to reintroduce the bill this year.
Currently, how vehicle navigation systems track your car as well as how they store and share that information varies by automaker.
