If these self driving cars are going to gain popularity, maybe there should be some sort of standard communication protocol by which the cars can talk to each other and let the others around it know 1) what it sees, so that other cars can correct anything it's blind to currently, and 2) what it's about to do, so that they can make better decisions about when to switch lanes.
I agree, though I'm sure some people will have problems with these devices sharing information.
I'd probably be one of those people, too. But if it's all kept locally and not uploaded to google's (or whoever's) servers, i'd be okay with it. I'd be 100% surprised if Google wasn't actually going to send itself useful, personal data from the cars anyway. Gotta improve that advertising algorithm at all costs.
The more data they collect, the better the cars will be. The cars are only able to exist because of all the data Google already has. I wonder what it will take for people to stop complaining about one of the handful of global companies that's actually changing people's lives.I'd be 100% surprised if Google wasn't actually going to send itself useful, personal data from the cars anyway. Gotta improve that advertising algorithm at all costs.
Certain information, sure. Keep track of traffic around me so everyone can go the way that has less traffic, fine. Certain other information like keeping track of where I am at all times is not okay. I've had multiple co-workers tell me that Google correctly guessed where they worked (for their "Google Now") without them asking it to and without them telling Google where they worked. Same thing with their home. My one friend said something about Maps only showing him places he's been at a certain zoom level on Maps before. How does that sort of information gathered help everyone? It's just spying on you.
Well yeah, that makes sense. You didn't refute my point. I'm not a road, mapping a road doesn't violate my privacy. That's basically what I was saying before, "hey, let's get the cars to talk to each other so they can gain more information about the roads and result in a safer experience". Turns out, Google already does that. What I would be against is them sending my car's information (along with my information) as part of their collecting data on roads. They don't need to know that it was my car that mapped what area at what time (and therefore, I was at location x at time t, traveling towards location y).
Well, the discussion diverged from 'data that I generate by driving' to 'data being gathered by Google'. I wanted to add that post because of the latter discussion, as an addition to what flag said. There is not a lot of disagreement here - it's more that I think you miss some of the details of how this works. It's not just the road, and it's not just your location that is being gathered, analysed and processed by companies like Google. The Atlantic post does a very good job of detailing that Google's car only works because Google has mapped every inch of the route the car will take. This goes way beyond just knowing where the road is - Google wants to collect as much as they can. They have developed algorithms to find not just street signs but also store signs, house numbers, trees, cars, people, children and others (I wrote about how I think that is a privacy issue, too). Because the Google cars exchange information between them, it is very useful to know what car noticed what phenomena where, under what circumstances. They'd be foolish not to track every single one of their self-driving cars (note: from an engineering standpoint). Google's strategy has always been to collect all information and to figure out what to do with it later. It's not just the certain information you mentioned - they actively want to collect everything. I mean, have you ever checked accounts.google.com? Collecting data about you is the default setting.
Well, I think the problem comes that any time devices are set up to send and receive data, they immediately have a vulnerability (security-wise). Like, if you want to make sure you never have a virus on your computer, never put it on the internet. If you never want your cars hacked, don't let them send and receive data from other cars.
That's also a valid point. Usually the threat of a virus is contained safely inside the computer and the only thing that can happen is your identity is stolen or your files deleted - no physical harm. But now, you're inside the computer too, which is a big metal box going quickly on a road. Maybe it would be a good idea to have as little security issues as possible.
It's more for actual drivers, if my memory serves me correctly, but there's a program over at University of Michigan which aims to make a standardized protocol where cars can transmit information to each other and give warnings. I imagine it would be easily used by self-driving cars, though.