—– Original Message —–

From: Salvador Minguijon

To: Salvador Minguijon

Sent: Monday, July 24, 2006 5:49 PM

Subject: “Pay as you drive” Information

Dear gentlemen.

I have upgraded the information of my “Pay As You Drive Directory” site.

Some reader ask me if Peter Schaar’s comments about the privacy could be obtained in English. Unfortunately I don’t know.

This month I also linked a similar information of the French CNIL, as I am sure that there will also be readers that have problems to understand it, I have allowed myself to make a small summary:

– The CNIL frances disapproves a project of the type “Pay as you drive” because:

– It registers the realization of illegal acts (excess of speed) and according to the French law, private people cannot register these acts. 

– They consider that the lost of privacy that implies the registration of where and when the user is, is not proportional to the objective that is sought and that it is not another that a slight reduction in the amount of the insurance of the automobile.

On the other hand the main argument of the Bundesbeauftragte für den Datenschutz und die Informationsfreiheits was that this project attempts to the intimacy because:

– With this information the user’s social relationships can be traked.

– Although being voluntary, it would exist the danger that it is a very competitive product and it is imposed in the market in such a way that the users don’t have the real freedom of choosing it.

The reaction of the insurance companies according to my exposition (in Spanish) in the Internet World Congress was:

– To wait. Everything seems to indicate and more and more clearly that there is not another alternative to the problems that it generates the traffic that the Road Charge systems. This solves practically all the problems that carries the “Pay as you drive” project.
– To work with companies (IBM, Siemens) with a lot of experience in the work with sensitive information as banks, hospitals, administration, etc. that they can guarantee the custody of the information.

– To do it without confidential information. In this way the developener project is the system Tripsense, that is being proved massively by Progressive and to whose tests have just added Aviva Canada.

    – There has not been any project that has opted to process part of the information in the vehicle and to transmit only summary information. It is curious because this was the solution thought in the original project.

Meanwhile Siemens continues developing its project, it seems to be that every time with more convincing and energy.

I have created a BLOG where I want to keep on these comments, together with those that you consider opportune to send me.

Yours sincerely.

                                                                                                Salvador Minguijon