Your Tesla Is Just As Bad As Your iPhone

Privacy Is Dead, and Elon Musk Killed It

Tesla’s cars are not just electric vehicles – they are rolling surveillance platforms that harvest vast amounts of personal data. As one digital-rights lawyer observes, “Teslas are truly rolling surveillance platforms” (theguardian.com). Behind the sleek touchscreens and autopilot demos, every Tesla quietly scans drivers and passengers, logging details from vehicle performance to facial expressions.

This story unpacks Tesla’s data-collection architecture in full – the telemetry, in-cabin sensors, location logs, and even biometric monitoring – and shows how Tesla has built a business more about spying than selling cars. I examine how essential Tesla features are tied to constant data sharing, effectively coercing owners into compliance. I detail recent scandals (internal camera leaks, a Mozilla privacy probe, biometric lawsuits) and outline Tesla’s hidden data-broker economy (usage-based insurance, city traffic-analytics, even selling “anonymized” driver profiles). I reveal Elon Musk’s political maneuvering around data – from praising anti-privacy movements like Spain’s far-right Vox to suing OpenAI over AI training data – and sketch chilling plausible futures (protests herded by Teslas, emotional biometrics for profit, stress-level analytics sold to employers).

Finally, I explain how Tesla’s model is rapidly normalizing across the auto industry, eroding privacy norms and consumer consent. The implications are urgent: without regulatory reform and public pushback, the age of data colonialism on wheels will only grow. We end with a call to action for consumers and policymakers. All claims below are backed by reporting and expert testimony (foundation.mozilla.org reuters.com scrippsnews.com).

Car Data on Tap: Telemetry, Cameras, and Sensors Everywhere

Tesla vehicles collect everything. According to Tesla’s own privacy notice, the company gathers “lots of data about your car and your use of your car” – from basic facts like your name, address, email and VIN to detailed logs of when and where you charge, which apps you use, and how you drive (foundation.mozilla.org). Every modern Tesla is packed with nine or more cameras (forward, rear, side, and an in-cabin camera) and numerous sensors and microphones (theguardian.com foundation.mozilla.org). These feed Tesla everything from Autopilot video to cabin snapshots. The in-cabin camera watches the driver for attention (and was recently the subject of an Illinois lawsuit over facial scanning (news.bloomberglaw.com). Newer Teslas even have a 4D in-cabin radar: Tesla boasts this can “detect the presence of people inside the vehicle…and pick up on things like the heartbeat of a pet or small child” (teslarati.com). In short, the car “needs to monitor and collect a large amount of data” to enable its features (theguardian.com).

All of this data is transmitted back to Tesla (and often stored in the cloud). Tesla’s officials quietly admit that location, performance, and sensor data are sent from the car: for example, after a highly publicized Cybertruck explosion in Las Vegas, Tesla gave police the full driving logs and charging-station history to reconstruct the driver’s journey from Colorado to Nevada (scrippsnews.com). Even beyond high-profile accidents, every Tesla trip is logged: GPS breadcrumbs, speed, brake usage, Autopilot engagement, cabin climate settings, and even driver songs or navigation searches. An Associated Press report sums it up: “Many of the latest cars not only know where you’ve been and where you are going…they also often have access to your contacts, your call logs, your texts” by virtue of smartphone integration (scrippsnews.com). In practice, a Tesla owner’s entire digital life – where you go, what you listen to, what you say, even who you talk to – can be tracked by the vehicle.

Beyond raw telemetry, Tesla’s system synthesizes higher-level biometrics. For instance, the driver-monitoring camera uses facial-recognition technology: it can recognize if the same registered driver is behind the wheel, and if their eyes wander off the road (In fact, in a 2022 Illinois lawsuit, the company was accused of illegally scanning owners’ faceprints via this camera without explicit consent news.bloomberglaw.com). Similarly, cabin devices like Tesla’s rumored “Bioweapon Defense Mode” or the seatbelt pressure sensors can infer passenger presence or even measure heart rate. Every beep of the microphone, every tap on the touchscreen, becomes another data point. As Mozilla’s car-privacy guide warns, a Tesla “can collect a good amount of data … everything from your name, address … to lots of data about your car and your use of your car, when and where you charge your car, infotainment system data, Tesla mobile app data, Autopilot data…”(foundation.mozilla.org).

In practice this means Tesla accumulates a staggering data profile on each customer. The infotainment logs alone reveal music tastes, website visits (via browser and sentry-mode camera tags), and even private photos if connected. Tesla’s mobile app shares location, charging status and vehicle diagnostics. The cameras feed external video (for Autopark, Sentry Mode alarms, Summon features) and internal video (for security clips, Autopilot training, and driver monitoring) back to Tesla servers. Even advertised “privacy” controls have loopholes: Tesla claims images remain anonymous, but former employees revealed their internal tools could pinpoint exactly where a video was taken – often revealing the owner’s home address (reuters.com). In other words, as soon as a Tesla’s cameras capture a scene, Tesla can (and does) know exactly who was there. (Reuters investigators heard about this first-hand in 2023, when an ex-employee explained that Tesla’s system connected dashcam clips to GPS data, so “anyone viewing the videos…could determine exactly where the Tesla owner lived” reuters.com.)

Key collection points:

• Vehicle Telemetry and Location: Speed, braking, steering, GPS, battery usage (how/when/where you charge) foundation.mozilla.org scrippsnews.com.

• Infotainment Logs: Radio stations, navigation addresses, web searches, voice commands, Bluetooth contacts, calendar events foundation.mozilla.org scrippsnews.com.

• External Cameras & Sensors: Videos/photos of road and environment from all around the car (used for Autopilot, Summon, Autopark) foundation.mozilla.org reuters.com.

• Internal Cameras & Radars: In-cabin recordings of passengers, facial and emotion analysis, occupant presence (seatbelt), even heart rate detection theguardian.com teslarati.com.

• Smartphone Integration: Syncing calls/texts/emails and location from your phone gives Tesla indirect access to phone data (address books, messaging, etc.) scrippsnews.com.

Taken together, this is not a car – it’s a mobile data-collection platform. As the Mozilla Foundation bluntly put it, all cars reviewed (including Tesla) could gather “deeply personal data such as sexual activity, immigration status, race, facial expressions, weight, health … and where you drive” via built-in sensors (foundation.mozilla.org). And because Tesla’s sensor suite is so extensive (nine cameras and more), it likely harvests far more data per vehicle than competitors (washingtonpost.com theguardian.com).

The Price of “Connectivity”: Coercing Owners into Surveillance

Tesla doesn’t just collect data – its cars require data connectivity to work normally. In its Privacy Notice, Tesla explicitly warns: if you try to “opt out” of data collection, your car will lose critical capabilities. As Mozilla’s analysis highlighted, Tesla writes plainly that if owners ask them to “deactivate connectivity,” then “certain advanced features…such as over-the-air updates, remote services, and … in-car features such as location search, Internet radio, voice commands, and web browser” will not work (foundation.mozilla.org). In fact, the notice says that opting out of vehicle data collection may render the car “reduced functionality, serious damage, or inoperability” (foundation.mozilla.org). In simple terms: to keep your Tesla running fully, you basically have to let it spy on you.

This hidden trade-off is a form of coercion. Tesla decks its cars with smartphones-level features – web browsing, real-time navigation, streaming music, mobile app controls – and then ties them to the company’s data servers. Want your Tesla’s touchscreen or navigation to work? It must ping Tesla’s cloud with your location and vehicle state. Want firmware upgrades for new Autopilot features? Tesla pushes them over-the-air, which requires the car to constantly phone home. By default, the car “provides a seamless experience while protecting your privacy,” Tesla claims – but the only way to get the experience is to let it collect everything (foundation.mozilla.org).

In effect, Tesla turns privacy into an all-or-nothing choice: agree to full surveillance or give up basic functions. Mozilla summarizes this bluntly: Tesla’s opt-out boils down to turning your car into a “car-shaped brick” (foundation.mozilla.org) if you try to shut off connectivity. Few consumers realize how binding this is when they sign the initial sale contract. Nobody explicitly reads that agreeing to “enhanced connectivity” means surrendering streaming, navigation, even emergency updates. As one privacy consultant notes, Tesla’s model effectively makes every driver a data provider: “Consumers need to have control over their data,” but Tesla’s ecosystem offers almost no workable option except mass data-collection (scrippsnews.com).

In practice, then, every Tesla owner is nudged into compliance. If you plug in your credentials on the Tesla app, connect your phone via Bluetooth, or use any paid feature, the car silently uploads your data. And even if an owner might wish to turn off a particular tracker (say, disabling location in the app), Tesla still requires a connected modem for crash alerts and stolen-vehicle tracking. For example, when Sentry Mode (the alarm camera) is triggered, Tesla automatically backs up video to the cloud, even though owners might assume those clips stay local (classaction.org). Every time a Tesla vehicle collects data (and it does this essentially by default), it strengthens the company’s case that this surveillance is “opted-in.”

Critics point out how flimsy this supposed consent is. Tesla’s policies promise anonymity – “camera recordings remain anonymous and are not linked to you or your vehicle,” one document claims – but as we’ve seen, those promises fall apart in practice (reuters.com). Owners never explicitly consent to every new use of their data; instead it’s buried in thick user agreements and convoluted privacy statements. If anything, Tesla’s approach treats data collection as a must-have feature, not a feature one can disable.

Privacy Scandals: When the Cameras Fail

Tesla’s internal surveillance system has already been caught on the wrong side of ethics and law. In April 2023, Reuters revealed that Tesla employees were sharing owners’ private camera footage among themselves (reuters.com). According to ex-staffers, private chat groups at Tesla showed “highly invasive videos and images recorded by customers’ car cameras” from 2019–2022 (reuters.com). These were not marketing demos – they included “Tesla customers in embarrassing situations,” one former employee said, such as a man seen completely naked next to his car (reuters.com). Even an accident replay was passed around: one video showed a Tesla veering at high speed into a neighborhood bicyclist, throwing a child rider into the air. That horrific clip “spread around a Tesla office… like wildfire,” the worker recalled (dreuters.com). As Mozilla noted, this abuse of the camera system was a betrayal of Tesla’s promise that video would stay anonymous (foundation.mozilla.org reuters.com).

These revelations echo across other investigations. U.S. privacy researchers and the media have since documented routine privacy lapses at carmakers. Mozilla’s Privacy Not Included car guide (Sept 2023) blasted all 25 major automakers (including Tesla) with failing marks. It found that virtually every modern vehicle can capture intimate data – even things like weight or emotion – via built-in cameras and sensors (foundation.mozilla.org). Tesla in particular was called out for having “confusing, lengthy, and vague” privacy policies (foundation.mozilla.org). The report notes that Tesla’s bold claims of security are undermined by incidents like the employee video-sharing scandal. “Data breaches are common” in the auto industry, it warned, “from Tesla employees gawking at videos captured by consumers’ cars” to hacks at other brands (foundation.mozilla.org).

Legal actions have followed these exposures. In California, a 2023 class-action complaint (Yeh et al. v. Tesla) quotes ex-employees saying Tesla’s tools let them “see inside people’s garages and their private properties… we could see their kids”(classaction.org). The suit points out that cameras have captured not only pets and houses but “customers’… children—a group that society has long recognized as vulnerable to exploitation and manipulation” (classaction.org). Tesla has denied many of these allegations or settled quietly, but the damage to trust is already done. In Illinois, another class-action in early 2022 claimed Tesla violated the state’s Biometric Information Privacy Act by scanning drivers’ faces with its cockpit camera without permission (news.bloomberglaw.com). If true, this means even law-abiding Tesla owners – who never opted in to facial recognition – had their biometrics harvested.

Independent audits and watchdogs have piled on. The 2024 Mozilla car privacy report found that over 75% of automakers claim the right to share or sell drivers’ data (washingtonpost.com) – and Tesla is no exception. Consumer groups warn that Tesla’s surveillance is no accident, but an intentional business asset. The Washington Post, covering the Las Vegas Cybertruck case, quoted privacy advocates calling these vehicles “panopticons on wheels,” capable of tracking protest attendance or clinic visits (washingtonpost.com). Experts note that when something “bad happens” like an accident, Tesla can be helpful – but at the cost of revealing “the kind of sweeping surveillance going on” in everyday driving (scrippsnews.com). All the while, Tesla says it’s committed to privacy and security. Its website proclaims “no one but you would have knowledge of your activities, location, or a history of where you’ve been” (scrippsnews.com). But given these inside stories and lawsuits, that promise rings hollow for many customers.

Turning Data into Dollars: The Hidden Monetization Engine

Perhaps the starkest evidence that Tesla is a data company is how it makes money from data. Tesla has quietly built an ecosystem where vehicle data feeds new revenue streams. The most obvious example is Tesla Insurance. Launched in 2019, Tesla’s captive insurance arm sets premiums based on its in-car “Safety Score,” a telematics system that tracks driving behavior. As one industry analysis explains, “Tesla’s entire insurance model hinges on telematics” (liveinsurancenews.com). Every hard brake, every sharp turn, every mile driven and even time-of-day is logged and factored into your monthly rate. In theory, safer Tesla drivers pay lower premiums. But in practice, this data-based pricing has been controversial: a California class-action alleges Tesla’s scoring algorithm was exploited to overcharge owners by unfairly penalizing them, for example, counting unavoidable “forward-collision warnings” as poor driving (liveinsurancenews.com). In other words, Tesla may literally be turning your personal driving record into profit via insurance.

And insurance is just the tip of the iceberg. Industry insiders believe Tesla (and other automakers) plan to sell aggregated data to third parties. Municipalities and navigation services have long purchased anonymized traffic and congestion data from fleets (think Waze or Here Maps). With millions of Teslas on the road, Tesla could license real-time traffic streams or parking occupancy info to city planners. Advertisers might pay to know where Teslas dwell or stop (profiling affluent neighborhoods, for example). Even law enforcement is implicitly buying in: after the Vegas blast, police credited Tesla for providing charging-station videos and software logs free of charge (scrippsnews.com) – but in other cases, police have sought Tesla footage under warrant, effectively treating Tesla as a video-provider. The Washington Post reports “local police departments sought video from Tesla cars that may have recorded a crime” or even towed vehicles to retrieve it (washingtonpost.com). In these scenarios, Tesla’s data helps solve crimes, but the broader precedent is clear: companies sit on treasure troves of evidence on every street corner.

There are already broader precedents for data sales. In 2023 a lawsuit forced General Motors to reveal it had sold the driving data of 1.8 million customers to insurers without their consent (scrippsnews.com). Experts warn it’s only a matter of time before many automakers treat driver profiles like Amazon treats browsing data. And indeed, Tesla’s own rhetoric hints at this future: in a 2023 profit memo, Tesla told investors that data “is the highest margin product that we sell,” though it did not publicly detail what data or to whom (scrippsnews.com).

Inside Tesla’s documents, we even find pointers to a “Big Data” business model. Its Privacy Notice allows sharing data “with affiliates, business partners, and third party service providers,” including “data gathered or derived from user activities”(foundation.mozilla.org). Indeed, Tesla explicitly lists “Tesla Insurance” among affiliates it can share with. Another section adds that Tesla may hand data to government “if required by law,” but also whenever it’s “essential to protect national security or public safety” (theguardian.com) – a broad phrase that could cover anything from terrorist threats to local protests. Privacy experts warn this is dangerously vague, essentially granting Tesla a license to sell or provide video & location data to “any government agency (FBI, ICE, etc.) that comes asking”(theguardian.com).

Even without overt sales, the value is enormous. Recall the Spanish lithium example: Extremadura’s new lithium project advertises it could supply material for 800,000 Tesla Model 3s per year (mobilityportal.eu). For Tesla, everything about Spain – from lithium mines to data policies – is a potential bargain. That Vox endorsement by Musk fueled speculation precisely because Vox promises looser regulations on mining and data. If Musk can align Spain’s raw material needs with his data ambitions, the payoff could be massive. As one analysis put it, Tesla’s support for Vox followed a “patent pattern:” backing parties likely to deregulate and favor his business interests (en.wikipedia.org).

In short, Tesla’s price of admission to its ecosystem isn’t just money – it’s your data. The luxury of fast EVs and cutting-edge software comes bundled with high-voltage data collection, fueling many unseen profit centers.

Elon Musk’s New Politics: Data Diplomacy and Disruption

The data-driven model at Tesla is inseparable from the ideology of its CEO. Elon Musk has become as active in politics as in product development – and data is central to both. Most recently, Musk openly aligned with anti-regulatory, far-right movements that promise easier access to data (and resources). In February 2025, for example, Musk publicly endorsed Spain’s Vox party on social media, proclaiming flatly: “Vox will win the next election” (english.elpais.com). Vox’s platform calls for relaxing EU controls on mining and industry – a welcome sign for Musk’s interest in Spain’s lithium reserves. At the same time Musk has complained about Europe’s privacy laws, suggesting they stifle innovation. He even clashed with the EU on other fronts: his company X (formerly Twitter) has come under Irish and UK scrutiny for ignoring GDPR when training its new AI, Grok (politico.eu). In April 2025 Ireland’s Data Protection Commission opened a formal probe into X’s use of Europeans’ data for AI, highlighting that Musk’s empire is already at war with EU data regulation (spolitico.eu).

Beyond Europe, Musk has turned Tesla’s role in geopolitics. As said, he is in talks with the Spanish government over lithium mining in Extremadura, potentially offering Tesla’s AI and “data-sharing” in return for cheap access to raw materials. (Exact details are murky, but analysts have pointed out the timing and context suggest Musk’s Venezuela/EU diplomacy style is in play.) In the U.S., Musk has aggressively positioned himself as a sovereign powerbroker, lobbing for or against policies that affect data use. He is known to demand autonomy for his companies (refusing oversight even from his own Congress-appointed roles), and he relishes clashes with regulators.

Meanwhile, Musk’s feud with AI powerhouse OpenAI takes a data-flavored turn. Once a co-founder of OpenAI, Musk now accuses it of betraying its non-profit mission. In May 2025 he vowed to proceed with a lawsuit aiming to block OpenAI’s “closed-source” business model, arguing that OpenAI’s transition still enriches insiders (Altman, investors, Microsoft) (reuters.com). Essentially, Musk is fighting over who controls the next generation of AI – and that battle is really about data. He contends that if corporations like OpenAI are left unchecked with massive data, they will skew AI toward profit-driven ends. Musk’s insurgent politics (whether it’s supporting Vance in Canada, Trump-like policies in the U.S., or Vox in Spain) all trace back to one goal: loosening legal constraints on how data is gathered and used.

These moves have real consequences for drivers. A Musk-aligned government could weaken privacy enforcement. Consider: if Spain’s Vox retakes power on a promise of deregulation, there might be fewer legal barriers to Tesla’s data collection practices. Already, a recent LSE policy analysis warned that Musk is “destabilizing” Europe’s regulatory consensus because his businesses need state patronage and lax rules to expand (blogs.lse.ac.uk). And Musk has personal stakes: American attorneys now push for bills like the bipartisan Auto Data Privacy Act (Dec 2024), telling Americans they shouldn’t have to “trade [their] privacy for convenience” in their cars (lee.senate.gov). Musk’s outspokenness on these issues helps frame the debate.

In short, Tesla under Musk isn’t just a carmaker – it’s a political movement that equates fewer rules with better innovation. But critics counter that this is a self-serving vision: one tech billionaire pushing for unfettered access to personal data worldwide.

A Dystopian Road Ahead: What If…?

Speculative? Maybe. But as Tesla’s surveillance empire grows, some dark scenarios loom large. Privacy experts warn: just because something can be done with Tesla’s data doesn’t mean it won’t be tried.

• Protest Geo-fencing: Imagine authorities ordering Tesla to block cars from certain areas, or to treat them as virtual barriers. With over-the-air control, Tesla could (if instructed) disable Summon/autopilot within a protest radius, effectively corralling drivers. Given Musk’s political gambits and any future alignment with a hard-right government, it’s easy to envision a future where a mayor uses the Tesla fleet like a security grid. (Recall ACLU warnings about license-plate readers; substitute that with live video from thousands of Teslas.) Rights groups already worry about connected-car location logs being subpoenaed to identify protest participants. The Washington Post notes that law enforcement has even used cars as cameras for crime – will they do the same to suppress dissent?

• Emotional Manipulation via Biometrics: In its current incarnation, Tesla’s cabin radar can sense heartbeats (teslarati.com) and its cameras can read facial expressions. Now imagine this feeding into the car’s interface. Are you angry or stressed at work? Tesla’s screen could quietly suggest a calming playlist or ad, or even switch your route to avoid traffic, claiming “for your safety.” Worse, advertisers could pay to see aggregate “stress maps” of commutes, or Tesla’s own AI could analyze mood trends across its fleet. Industry experts already explore “biometric sensing” in cars for safety – but they also note the potential to repurpose this data for marketing or enforcement (teslarati.com).

• Selling Real-Time Stress Data: Employers or insurers may soon crave live health signals. Already, wearable devices sell step and heart-rate data to insurance firms. A Tesla with a biometric radar could (theoretically) log sudden heart-rate spikes or voice stress patterns. Then, the company could offer an “emotional analytics” feed: stress scores of drivers over time. Imagine if an employer required a Tesla Professional lease and got alerts when an employee’s car “heartbeat metric” exceeded a threshold – or insurers adjusting premiums mid-drive. It sounds like science fiction, but with companies selling body metrics (like Fitbit’s past deals with insurers), the idea is alarmingly plausible.

• Car as Weaponized Surveillance: Musk often talks about over-the-air updates – but what if a future update turns the cars into police tools? For example, corporate or government instructions could redirect cameras to record specific license plates or faces, turning every Tesla into a roaming spy cam. Or the fleet could be synchronized: one model’s sensors could “spot” a wanted criminal or political opponent, and immediately relay coordinates to all Teslas in range (a neo-“vision network”). Such features already flirt with reality: US police car fleets use “real-time crime centers” with live feeds and data analytics. Given that scenario planning, privacy advocates argue we’re perilously close to cars that not only surveil their own drivers, but others around them en masse.

While these scenarios are speculative, they are grounded in Tesla’s existing tech stack. Critics note that Tesla’s data access already presents “the kind of sweeping surveillance” that can be abused (scrippsnews.com). Every advanced feature today is a new vector tomorrow. When an owner agrees to “Data Sharing” for autopark or FSD, they may unknowingly unlock these futures.

As Albert Fox Cahn of S.T.O.P. warns, these connected vehicles are essentially “panopticons on wheels” (washingtonpost.com). The convenience of an electric, self-driving car might come at the cost of making every commute a potential privacy violation, - for the driver and for anytime he/she encounters on the way.

Big Auto’s New Norm: The End of Privacy and Consent

Tesla is at the vanguard, but it is not alone. Regulators around the world are beginning to raise the alarm about exactly this model. In mid-2023, California’s privacy agency announced it was reviewing “automakers’ data privacy practices”(reuters.com). Its director observed that “modern vehicles are effectively connected computers on wheels” collecting everything about drivers and bystanders (reuters.com). Consumer groups are already calling car data “the new gold rush of the auto industry” (reuters.com). A Washington Post analysis notes that over 75% of car brands say they can sell or share driving data (washingtonpost.com), and more than half will hand data to law enforcement if asked. Only the smallest brands (Renault/Dacia) give customers a real right to delete their data. In other words, every automaker is moving toward a Tesla-like model: big profits from selling raw human behavior.

The myth of meaningful consent is breaking down. Customers may not even know what they agreed to. Tesla’s own policies are convoluted and often contradictory. Its website claims you can delete your account anytime (foundation.mozilla.org), but the fine print dodges many user rights. Mozilla’s privacy experts pointed out that Tesla’s statements on user rights are confusing – are you truly allowed to delete your data in, say, China or Brazil? It’s not clear (foundation.mozilla.org). Tesla’s “privacy center” phone lines do not respond to questions; it took lawsuits and media exposés just to get basic answers.

Meanwhile, even the concept of “anonymous” data is eroding. In theory, Tesla says it “does not link location information with your identity” (foundation.mozilla.org). Yet as noted, internal tools showed that was false: location metadata was clearly viewable by employees (reuters.com). Third-party researchers have confirmed that if a car’s software is “fed” to a facial-recognition or location algorithm, anonymity vanishes. Worse, the industry is normalizing mass surveillance. By 2024, even insurance companies are openly urging usage-based pricing, and regulators are considering consumer bills like the U.S. Auto Data Privacy Act, designed to let drivers reclaim control. Bipartisan sponsors in Congress have declared “ownership should mean control” and that no one should “have to trade their privacy for convenience” in their vehicles (lee.senate.gov).

And yet, until now, Tesla’s model has been embarrassingly lucrative and inertia-ridden. Every new generation of “smart” car appears to double down on data harvesting. Consumers have almost no practical opt-out: turn off internet connectivity and lose navigation, refuse the app and lose your charging records, decline updates and get stuck with outdated (or unsafe) software. Carmakers have spent decades training buyers to think of mobility purely in terms of speed and efficiency, not privacy. The result: the surveillance auto industry is now here, and Tesla is leading the charge.

Figure:

• Think of your car as more like a smartphone on wheels – only a smartphone that logs your every move, listens to your conversations, watches you (and your kids) by camera, and sells the metadata to the highest bidder. Like for example the iPhone 16, on which I have reported on Youtube and on Substack.
  

Call to Action: Reclaiming the Driver’s Seat on Data

The story of Tesla’s data empire is a warning: if we do nothing, driving will become a chapter in the age of data colonialism. Cars will evolve into satellite-state agents for private companies and governments. To stop this, action must come on several fronts:

• Policy Reform: Regulators must catch up. Laws like the proposed Auto Data Privacy and Autonomy Act are a start – senators warned that Americans “deserve to decide who has access” to their car data and should not have to give up privacy just to drive (lee.senate.gov). Similar rules are needed globally: require default local processing of sensor data, strict opt-in for any sharing, and limits on law-enforcement access (for example, a warrant requirement to obtain in-car footage). Privacy commissioners should force carmakers to drop the Orwellian “public safety” loopholes in their policies (theguardian.com). And competition authorities should question acquisitions: e.g., if Tesla merges with a mapping or mobility company, what cross-selling of data will follow?

• Industry Accountability: Tesla’s insurers, data partners, and software vendors must be held responsible too. Lawsuits and fines for misuse of auto data should be scaled up – just as utilities and banks have constraints, cars should too. Insurance regulators, for instance, could outlaw algorithms that unfairly penalize or price drivers based on opaque metrics (liveinsurancenews.com). Cities should legislate oversight if automakers plan to sell urban mobility data (traffic flows, footfall, etc.) that citizens didn’t knowingly hand over.

• Consumer Awareness & Resistance: Drivers need to wake up. Just as thousands protested at Tesla stores to demand answers on Musk’s behavior, a public movement must form around data rights. Owners should demand genuine opt-out mechanisms or the right to run alternate (privacy-respecting) software in their cars. Use online communities and media (like this report) to spread knowledge. Technologists can help build aftermarket solutions (firewalls, dummy sensors, even hardware kill-switches) to break the surveillance default. Work with civil liberties groups to frame driving privacy as a core civil right – after all, “a car on the open road” symbolizes freedom, yet it’s becoming one of the most heavily surveilled aspects of our lives (washingtonpost.com).

• Data Solidarity: Finally, think globally. This is not just an American issue. Tesla’s practices (and Musk’s political moves in Europe, Asia, Latin America) are priming a model for the entire planet. Advocacy in the EU, UK, and beyond can push back on tailpipe and data standards. The fight to safeguard vehicle privacy must become an international cause, linking to struggles over facial recognition and digital trackers everywhere.

Tesla is far from the only car on the road – and its competitors are racing to catch up on data collection. But that only makes this moment more urgent. Cars reflect society. If we normalize cameras and sensors grabbing intimate data without scrutiny, we legitimize that in every other domain. By shining light on Tesla’s data-extraction empire, we aim to start a conversation. It’s time to rewrite the deal: no more privacy as the price of advanced driving.

Sources:

Investigative reports, court filings, and expert analyses from 2023–2025 foundation.mozilla.org
reuters.com
teslarati.com
liveinsurancenews.com
scrippsnews.com
washingtonpost.com
reuters.com
lee.senate.gov
(full citations above).

These include Reuters investigations into Tesla’s internal surveillance reuters.com, Mozilla privacy audits of connected cars foundation.mozilla.org legislative press releases, and academic commentary.