GM agrees to pay $12.75M in California driver privateness settlement

Normal Motors has reached a privacy-related settlement with a gaggle of legislation enforcement companies led by California Legal professional Normal Rob Bonta.

Again in 2024, The New York Instances reported that automakers together with GM have been sharing details about their clients’ driving conduct with insurance coverage firms, and that some clients have been involved that their insurance coverage charges had gone up in consequence.

The settlement announcement from Bonta’s workplace equally alleges that GM offered “the names, contact data, geolocation information, and driving conduct information of tons of of 1000’s of Californians” to Verisk Analytics and LexisNexis Threat Options, that are each information brokers.  Bonta’s workplace additional alleges that this information was collected by GM’s OnStar program, and that the corporate made roughly $20 million from information gross sales.

Nevertheless, Bonta’s workplace additionally stated the information didn’t result in elevated insurance coverage costs in California, “probably as a result of beneath California’s insurance coverage legal guidelines, insurers are prohibited from utilizing driving information to set insurance coverage charges.”

As a part of the settlement, GM has agreed to pay $12.75 million in civil penalties and to cease promoting driving information to any client reporting companies for 5 years, Bonta’s workplace stated. GM has additionally agreed to delete any driver information that it nonetheless retains inside 180 days (until it obtains consent from clients), and to request that Lexis and Verisk delete that information.

“Normal Motors offered the information of California drivers with out their data or consent and regardless of quite a few statements reassuring drivers that it will not achieve this,” Bonta stated in a press release, including that the settlement “requires Normal Motors to desert these unlawful practices and underscores the significance of the information minimization in California’s privateness legislation — firms can’t simply maintain on to information and use it later for one more function.”

GM had previously settled with the Federal Trade Commission over its information gross sales, with a closing order banning Normal Motors and OnStar from promoting sure information with client reporting companies.

GM told Reuters that the settlement “addresses Sensible Driver, a product we discontinued in 2024, and reinforces steps we’ve taken to strengthen our privateness practices.”