The Tesla Insurance website says it uses “anonymized, aggregate data” to provide lower insurance rates to owners. The website also says Tesla Insurance does not currently use data from individual vehicles, such as video footage or telemetry data.
According to Matthew Edmonds, Tesla’s Head of Insurance, the use of individual data would only happen with the driver’s authorization, and the laws of the state in which they live.
“It really comes down to case law, and how much of the data we can utilize. It would have to be a state-by-state proposition,” Edmonds said at an insurance conference in 2019.
Even though the data they collect now is aggregated, they are collecting a lot of information from the vehicles they insure. Twitter user Tristan recently posted a long list of telemetry data, which he says is collected on a per drive basis.
- Unique Drive ID
- Record Version
- Car Firmware Version
- Driver Profile Name
- Start / End Time
- Drive Duration
- Start / End Odometer
- # of Autopilot Strikeouts
- # of Forward Collision Warnings
- # of Lane Departure Warnings
- # of ABS activations (All & User)
- Time spent within 1s of car in front
- Time spent within 3s of car in front
- Acceleration Variance
- Service Mode
- Delivered
He also notes the Driver Profiles allow the automaker to know if there are different drivers. This can then be used to differentiate driver behaviour.
As Tristan points out, the data can be used to provide deep insights about driver behaviour. This can be both advantageous (lower rates), but also dangerous (potentially higher rates if you have a heavy right foot).
Tesla Insurance is currently only available in California, but it should be expanding to several other states in the near future.
Knowing Tesla is able to collect all this information about your driving habits, would you sign up? Let us know in the comments below.
* # of Autopilot Strikeouts
* # of Forward Collision Warnings
* # of Lane Departure Warnings
* # of ABS activations (All & User)
* Time spent within 1s of car in front
* Time spent within 3s of car in front
* Acceleration Variance
* Service Mode
* Delivered(2/2)
— Tristan (@rice_fry) April 10, 2021
