Driving: OnStar's Big Brother Ends Police Chases
If the police try to pull you over, and you decide to run instead, you might first check to see if you car has OnStar. The remote vehicle emergency assistance service from GM will soon be used as a deterrent to high speed chases. Instead of spike strips, barricades and police bullets, the OnStar operator will simply intervene. Here is an excerpt from an OnStar press release:
OnStar's, "Stolen Vehicle Slowdown (SVS) will help reduce the likelihood of fatal crashes during high speed police chases...
According to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration statistics, over 30,000 police chases occur yearly. Last year, 404 people nationwide were killed in crashes involving police chases. SVS will allow law enforcement officers to request OnStar to slow down a pursued vehicle remotely; a signal can be sent to the vehicle that interacts with the power train system to cut off the flow of fuel to the engine. This service works together with OnStar's stolen vehicle location service to apprehend car thieves safely. SVS will be available on nearly 1.7 million Model Year 2009 GM vehicles as part of the basic OnStar package."
We have just been discussing the issue of OnStar on the KARL ON CARS blog. Various pros and cons were discussed but this is absolutely ridiculous! If GM makes this standard on their cars, they can forget about having me as a GM owner!
I usually try not to be paranoid about this stuff, but it seems to me that GM is going a little too far here. Seems like we are being softened up to accept these intrusions into our lives. Sure, it's a great idea to stop a car if a thief steals yours and the police are chasing him, but where does it lead? How many other things can this apply to, and at what point are we not given the liberty to be human. It's all just a little too creepy for me.
I had already not liked the inclusion of On-Star in many GM vehicles just because I don't have a use for it. But, now this feature comes along and makes me like it even less. In fact, it just gives me another reason to not choose a GM vehicle, and I have 2 of them now. So, of this is the case for me, it seems GM may be hurting itself more than helping itself. Then again, maybe most people don't care.
Smitty points out an interesting trend, not just in cars. With increased tracking ability in many areas computers can be set up to monitor our actions and tailor marketing accordingly.
Case in point: I wanted to watch the U.S. Open Tennis Tournament but I don't have cable TV. I did a cable search to see if I could get a live internet feed. A few days later I got a telemarketing call (automated) telling me about a new service. Now, did my internet search trigger the call?
In Karl's blog he points out some interesting situations where you wouldn't want GM shutting your car down. I remember driving my wife the hospital in labor. It was late at night and I had to drive fast to get there in time. Good thing I didn't have OnStar.
My question for this issue is how does Onstar know what vehicle to shut down, unless the customer provides the license number in their profile....that is of course optional.
Do the police have to give a location to Onstar and they track down that particular model, traveling at X speed......
How quickly is this accomplished?
How can Onstar pinpoint a particular car without any inputs? When you need your doors unlocked or your car is stolen you call and give them your information giving them somewhere to start....