AAA ACE Teen Pilot Program warning

Joe Touch, via Dave Farber:

I was recently contacted by AAA California inviting us to participate in their ACE Teen Program.

This voluntary program provides a GPS tracking device with cellphone uplink that can be placed in your teenager's car. The device is provided by a third party, who also supports a website for convenient access to tracking information.

The alleged goal of the program is to allow parents to provide feedback on their teen's driving habits, esp. when the parents are not in the car. An additional "feature" is an On-Star-like capability that, in the event your teen's car needs AAA assistance, the parent can allow AAA to determine the vehicle's exact location.

I'll ignore the issue of parent/child privacy, since the program doesn't focus on whether the device is in the car with or without the teen's knowledge. Let's assume the latter.

I had a long discussion with AAA about how this program was badly conceived. The risks include:

Posted by Jim Zellmer at August 5, 2011 1:02 AM
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