• cm0002@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    The motion sensors in your phone are able to pull enough information to determine, with high accuracy, whether or not you’re the one behind the wheel.

    (X) Doubt

    • ASeriesOfPoorChoices@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      doubt, but I’d believe it.

      If we can tell if we are in the front or backseat due to how it feels when you go around corners and such, so can your phone.

      driver side vs passenger would be the same deal.

      of course, this is presuming the phone is on your person. Which, if you weren’t driving - it would be.

      • CosmicTurtle0@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        4 months ago

        But this kind of thing is ripe for unintended consequences at best and flat out bad data at worst.

        When I drive I put my phone in the center so I can see the map. If me and my passenger’s phones are in the center, who is marked as driving when I get into an accident?

        From there, why stop at one phone? Let’s put several phones in the back seat, including mine. Hell, let’s have a burner phone that I use only for driving that has a throw away account. Or let’s go back to old fashioned maps and GPS devices while our phones are turned off. Meanwhile, at home, I’ve spun up a virtual device where it is very peacefully driving a route. Perfectly. Then I have another virtual device that is driving a different route on the other side of the world driving erratically.

        These companies are forgetting that the data from phones are data from devices, not people. If you’re going to spy on me, I’m going to make you fucking earn it.

        • ASeriesOfPoorChoices@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          “when i drive i put my phone in the center”

          that’s my point. Or a holder of some kind.

          as opposed to passengers who basically never put their phones in the center console.

          especially for a taxi or uber. That would be insane.

          again: the question is: are you a driver or a passenger? And I’m saying that that distinction is very plausible to make.

          if your sole goal is to make it harder to tell in an accident, sure. This is just sensor data, not clairvoyance.

          • BubbleMonkey@slrpnk.net
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            4 months ago

            My friend keeps her phone in a purse, which she puts on the floor of the passenger side whether she is driving or a passenger sitting shotgun. It’s always in the same place. When we take Ubers she usually sits in the middle so she can see, and puts the purse between her feet. Thus her phone is almost never on her person in the car.

            I suspect this is true for a lot of people who use purses or other bags as every day carry. Or perhaps it’s actually in the passenger seat, lots of people use that for bags when driving solo.

            So while it may be true for you that your phone is on you while a passenger, that’s a ton of people it isn’t true for at all, who would then be in the “bad data” camp.

            • ASeriesOfPoorChoices@lemmy.world
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              4 months ago

              right, but your friend doesn’t put their purse in back seat if they’re sitting in the front, or visa versa, right?

              no person driving should have their phone on them when they’re driving, so it’s an easy spot to exclude. The rest is logic, sensors and probability.

    • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Motion sensors don’t provide localization. Gps on cellphones are only really accurate to a few dozen meters.

      You can couple gps and motion (and changes in gps location) to fudge it. Which is why when you diverge off the route navigation provides… it takes it a moment to figure it out. In the display, they “know” you’re on the road so it doesn’t have to be that accurate, they just guess what lane you’re in based on direction and such.

      They’re certainly not going to know what seat you’re in.

        • ShepherdPie@midwest.social
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          4 months ago

          How do centrifugal forces determine which seat you’re sitting in inside of a car? Everyone in the car is going to be experiencing the same forces.

          • Wrench@lemmy.world
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            4 months ago

            He is correct that the forces are different. The equation for centripetal force is Fc = Mv2/R.

            Radius is the distance from the focal point, and each seat will be different distances.

            So he is technically correct that seat position could be calculated in perfect conditions with accurate measurements.

            But none of the data that reaches this service will be remotely accurate or complete enough to make that determination. It will only have one passengers phone data, and even if it collected everyones phone data, phone sensors have a margin of error well above what the difference would be. GPS data is only even marginally accurate up to something like 6ft, and really not even then. Then cars have a lot of other factors like suspension and compression in seats, etc, that would absorb enough of the forces to muddy the data even if accurate sensors were everywhere.

            Tl;dr; another cocky person that took a few physics courses but walked away with a poor understanding of real world applications talking out their ass.