MOUNT PLEASANT, S.C. (WCSC) – A Mount Pleasant man is accusing General Motors of using its cars’ internal systems to illegally collect data on drivers, then selling that data to third parties where it ultimately ended up in the hands of insurance companies.
The man recently filed the lawsuit, saying he never agreed to an OnStar membership when he bought his General Motors car. OnStar is an internal system that provides navigation, emergency services and other data through the car.
He also claims that since he had no knowledge of the OnStar system, he never consented to having his data collected, let alone sold to another company.
The lawsuit states the plaintiff’s insurance went up $273 over a year and half despite his having no accidents.
The lawsuit also names two data companies, LexisNexis and Verisk Analytics. The plaintiff’s attorney says documents from Verisk show they bought the data from GM and OnStar and compiled reports. Those reports laid out driver habits like “hard breaking events” and “rapid acceleration events” but without context like avoiding other drivers, heavy traffic or poor road conditions.
“To be sure, GM and OnStar were recently forced to admit that they had, in fact, been sharing drivers’ data with third parties such as LexisNexis and Verisk all along, stating, ‘As of March 20, 2024, OnStar Smart Driver customer data is no longer being shared with LexisNexis or Verisk,’” the suit states.
Court documents allege that by that time, tens or hundreds of millions of drivers’ data could have been collected and sold.
The lawsuit also alleges the practices used to collect the data could be breaking several federal wiretap and privacy rules as well as state unfair trade practices laws. Attorneys say the lawsuit could become a class-action for anyone who may have had their data collected and is seeking a jury trial to determine fault and damages.
Motley Rice is representing the plaintiff and filed the lawsuit on July 7 after collecting information about the practices themselves.
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Mount Pleasant man sues GM, OnStar over data collection practices
