Guest Commentary: How insurance tracking devices can be used against you
These days, everyone is looking for ways to save money. But one thing offered by insurance companies may cost you if you have an accident.
Car insurance companies are offering clients tracking devices to gather information about the driver’s behavior, with promises that doing so can lower insurance rates.
The idea of tracking devices sounds benign: rewarding safe drivers with discounts.
Many companies offering trackers include Allstate’s Drivewise app, Geico’s DriveEasy, Liberty Mutual’s RightTrack and Progressive’s Snapshot.
Insurance companies use the data from these devices to assess risk and set premiums — higher and lower, based on driving habits.
These devices, either installed in your vehicle or an app on your smartphone, capture information, including:
• How fast you are driving
• Breaking and accelerating habits
• Turning habits
• Daytime or nighttime driving
• Phone use while driving
• Where and for how long you are driving
The programs are voluntary. Insurance companies should only track your vehicle if you agree to be in the program. However, early in 2025, Allstate was sued by the state of Texas for illegally tracking drivers through their cell phones without their consent and using the data to justify charging more for car insurance.
Where tracking goes wrong
The first issue of these tracking devices is privacy. Trackers tell your insurance company where you are. With smartphone apps, data may be collected even if you are not driving.
What people may not consider is that this data could also be used against you by your own insurance company or another’s in the event of an accident. It is a double-edged sword. Tracking data can also be used to prove you are not at fault.
The data can be used as evidence by either side, potentially affecting compensation for your claim in these ways:
• Assign fault. Data can show that a driver was speeding, driving recklessly or using the phone at the time of the crash, potentially reducing compensation. This data can also be used to prove a driver was not at fault, potentially impacting compensation positively.
• Assess the severity of the accident. The data may suggest that injuries were not as severe as claimed or more severe than immediately evident.
What drivers should know
Deciding whether to use a tracking device is complicated. Ultimately, the risks of using car insurance tracking devices must be carefully weighed against the potential rewards.
To mitigate the risks, drivers should:
• Understand what data is being collected.
• Ask how the data will be used and who can access it.
• Consider potential legal implications before opting into a program.
• Regularly review driving data and ensure the device is installed correctly.
• Ask your insurer about their data retention policy. Some may keep the data for as long as you have an active policy with them, while others may retain it for a set period after the policy ends.
— Christopher J. Smith is managing partner at Goldstein, Buckley, Cechman, Rice, Purtz, Smith & Smith, P.A. His areas of expertise are personal injury, wrongful death, motor vehicle accidents, motorcycle accidents, slip/trip and falls. He is board certified in civil trial law. The attorneys at Goldstein, Buckley, Cechman, Rice and Purtz, Smith & Smith, P.A. have over 60 years of experience dealing with accidents.