Wiretaps On Wheels

New cars are surveillance on wheels, sending sensitive passenger data to carmakers and police. Cars also store enormous amounts of passenger data onboard, where police can extract it using specialized tools.

Key Findings Include:

• We estimate that law enforcement agencies could have accessed car data hundreds of thousands of times in 2020.

• Constitutional loopholes allow access to most data on cars without a warrant. Police can access information from car-connected phones and online accounts without the warrant typically required.

• U.S. immigration agencies weaponize car data. Other law enforcement agencies are poised to follow suit if they are not already doing so.

• New legislation, enforcement of existing data protection laws, and responsible car design and data storage policies can shift car data surveillance into reverse.

We extend a special thanks to our external reviewers: Andrea Amico, Founder & CEO, Privacy4Cars and Jerome Greco, Digital Forensics Supervising Attorney, The Legal Aid Society.

This report was supported in part by a grant from the Open Society Foundations and by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Read the full report.