Your Car Is Collecting More Data Than Your Phone. Here’s How to See It

Most new cars are connected to the internet, and many share driving data with automakers, insurers or data brokers unless you opt out. That data can include where you went, how fast you got there, how hard you braked and who you called on the way. Unlike your phone, your car rarely asks permission with a pop-up. The choices are buried in a settings menu, a companion app and a privacy policy that few drivers ever read.

We dug through the menus and privacy policies of five popular models to find out what they collect, and how to turn it off. We tested a compact sedan, a midsize SUV, a pickup truck, an electric hatchback and a three-row family van, all from this year or last. Here is what we learned, and what you can do about it in about 15 minutes.

What gets collected

Location history, hard braking, speed, phone contacts synced over Bluetooth and, in some models, in-cabin camera data. That list surprised several people on our team, especially those who think of their car as a simple machine for getting to work.

Modern vehicles contain dozens of small computers, and many of them produce data. Some of it stays inside the car and is overwritten after a short time. Some is sent to the automaker over a built-in cellular connection. The categories we found across our five test vehicles included:

• Location: GPS position, trip start and end points, and in some cases a full trip history.
• Driving behavior: speed, acceleration, hard braking, sharp cornering and the time of day you drive.
• Vehicle health: mileage, fuel or battery level, tire pressure and warning lights.
• Phone data: contacts, call logs and text messages copied over when you pair a phone.
• Voice: recordings or transcripts of voice commands, depending on the system.
• Cabin sensors: seat weight, seat belt use and, in some newer models, driver-facing cameras that watch for drowsiness.

Not every car collects every item, and not every item leaves the car. But all five of our test vehicles sent at least some location and driving data to the automaker by default.

Where the data goes

The privacy policies we read all said the automaker uses data to provide services, improve products and keep the car running safely. That part is reasonable. Remote unlocking, crash notification and over-the-air software updates all depend on a connection.

The fuzzier part is sharing. Several policies allowed data to be shared with “partners” or “affiliates,” which can include insurers, marketing firms and companies that buy and resell data. In some cases, the sharing only happens if you enroll in a program, such as a usage-based insurance discount. In others, the policy language was broad enough that it was hard to tell exactly who might receive what.

The insurance question

Some insurers offer discounts to drivers who share driving data. That can be a fair trade if you drive gently and know what you signed up for. The concern is drivers who enrolled without realizing it, perhaps by tapping through a long agreement when setting up a car’s app. If you are not sure whether your driving data is being shared with an insurer, ask your insurance agent directly and check the car’s app for any “driving score” or “safe driver” feature.

Treat your car like a phone on wheels, because that is what it is.

Privacy researcher Laura Bennett

How to limit it

Look for a “connected services” or “data sharing” menu in the car’s settings and in the automaker’s app. Delete old phones from the Bluetooth list before selling a car. Those two steps alone cover most of what an ordinary driver can control.

Here is the step-by-step routine we followed for each of our test vehicles:

1. Open the car’s main settings on the dashboard screen and look for sections named privacy, connectivity, data sharing or connected services.
2. Turn off any location sharing or driving data sharing you do not need. Some cars let you choose feature by feature.
3. Open the automaker’s smartphone app, go to account or privacy settings, and repeat the same review.
4. Look for any enrolled programs, such as driving scores, insurance partnerships or marketing preferences, and unenroll if you did not mean to join.
5. When pairing your phone over Bluetooth, decline contact and message syncing if you do not use hands-free texting.
6. Check the automaker’s website for a privacy request form. Several let you request a copy of your data or ask for it to be deleted.

Keep in mind that turning off connected services may disable features you like, such as remote start, live traffic or stolen-vehicle tracking. Most cars keep emergency crash notification active no matter what. Decide which features are worth the trade for you.

What we found in five cars

The menus varied a lot. In the compact sedan, privacy controls were easy to find under a clearly labeled tab, and each data category had its own switch. The midsize SUV split its settings between the dashboard and the app, and some options only appeared in the app. The pickup required us to call a customer service line to fully opt out of data sharing with third parties.

The electric hatchback had the most detailed controls of the group, likely because electric vehicles rely heavily on connected features for charging maps and battery updates. The family van was the hardest. Its privacy menu was four levels deep and used vague labels like “enhanced experience,” which turned out to control location sharing.

Across all five, we found one consistent problem: the setup process encouraged drivers to accept everything at once. If you bought your car recently and tapped “agree” during setup, it is worth going back to check.

We also requested a copy of our data from each automaker using their online privacy forms. Three sent a file within two weeks. One took more than a month, and one asked us to verify our identity by mail. The files we received included trip logs with dates and times, a record of every phone paired to the car and, in one case, a list of radio stations we had listened to. Seeing it laid out in a spreadsheet was eye-opening for the drivers on our team, and it convinced every one of them to change at least one setting.

Selling or returning a car

Before you sell, trade in or return a leased car, perform a factory reset from the settings menu. Remove your phone from the Bluetooth list, sign out of any accounts on the dashboard, clear saved addresses and unlink the car from your app. Then call or message the automaker to confirm the car is no longer tied to your account. Rental cars deserve the same care. Delete your phone from the rental’s Bluetooth list before you return the keys.

Key takeaway: Your car’s privacy settings live in two places, the dashboard and the app. Review both, and do it again after any major software update.

The road ahead

Connected cars bring real benefits, from automatic crash alerts to software fixes that arrive overnight. But drivers deserve to know what their vehicles record and who sees it. Several states have begun looking at rules for vehicle data, and some automakers have recently simplified their privacy menus. Until those changes reach every car on the road, the best protection is a few minutes in the settings menu. Set a reminder to check yours this weekend, and if you have a privacy tip from your own car, send it to our team.