Big Brother In Little Green Cars

Blogger Raises Privacy Concerns Over Nissan Leaf

I hope you excuse my laziness of late, but as I am very pressed for time and there is so much research I am doing at present; I will rely on some good sources to make my point at times.

Here is the point of this article and the previous---If you can track a Nissan Leaf around the world; know it's speed and exact location and vital characteristics; who is to say that the Chinese can't do exactly the same thing with the bogus chips and hardware they have been producing for our fighterjets?   Just wondering!

Does Nissan Motor Co.’s Leaf electric vehicle leave a trail of digital bread crumbs?
A U.S.-based blogger on SeattleWireless.net who says he owns a Leaf claims that the car’s telematic system automatically sends pinpoint data on the car’s location to any third-party RSS feed to which drivers subscribe. The Japanese automaker is “looking into the matter,” according to a company spokesman in Tokyo, who would not confirm or deny the claim.
Amid growing concerns about violations of privacy via the web, the matter has ricocheted through social media such as Twitter since the post was published this week.
The alleged glitch involves the apparent disclosure of data from Nissan’s Carwings system, which is an optional subscription-based service that works off the factory-installed GPS navigation system, providing information about the vehicle’s position, including latitude and longitude, direction, destination and speed via a GSM mobile phone connection.
The blog post states the location information is transmitted to web-based third parties whenever a driver updates his or her RSS feeds for information, such as the latest news and weather. “There is no way to prevent this data from being sent, nor does Nissan or Carwings warn you that your location data can be flung off to random third parties,” the blogger claims.
The blog post adds the location data is only sent out when an RSS feed is updated–and at the driver’s discretion–so it is unlikely to provide a constant stream of data on a vehicle’s whereabouts. However, the blogger claims that “it can provide real-time data at that moment where you are located.”
While Carwings is limited to owners of Leaf EVs in the U.S., the Internet-based service has been available since 2002 in Japan, where Nissan says some 850,000 people use it. Company officials say the U.S. and Japanese versions are essentially identical, but it is unclear if the alleged data transmission from the telematic system occurs in Japan–or has been detected by any Japanese car owners or third parties.
Nissan’s 2011 Leaf navigation system owner’s manual states broadly that: “Such data may be shared with Nissan’s parents, subsidiaries, affiliates, successors or assignees; authorized Nissan-certified LEAF dealers; Nissan’s marketing partners; your fleet company, if your vehicle is a fleet vehicle; your rental company, if your vehicle is a rental vehicle; and third party service providers such as cellular, information systems and data management providers.
It goes on to say that: “State laws allow access and use of data recorded by vehicle devices with the consent of the vehicle owner or pursuant to subscription agreement.”
So if Leaf drivers are reluctant to share with third parties, they may want to consider one simple option: unsubscribe.

From The Wall Street Journal