Washington and Oregon co-led a coalition of 36 attorneys general over the Smart Driver programme, and the settlement bars GM from collecting driving data without express consent.
Washington's attorney general announced on 29 October that GM will pay $220 million to resolve allegations about selling driver behaviour and location data to brokers, which passed it to insurers. Washington co-led a coalition of 36 attorneys general and receives $12.3 million. GM must now get express consent before collecting such data.
General Motors will pay $220 million to settle allegations that it sold drivers' behaviour and location data to third parties, among them data brokers, which in turn sold it to insurance companies. The settlement was announced on 29 October by the Washington State Attorney General's office, which says many insurers used the data in part to set rates.
Washington co-led the case with Oregon, heading a coalition of 36 attorneys general, and the state will receive $12.3 million. The account here is the attorney general's: the announcement carries no response from GM, so the company's position is limited to what the settlement records, namely the obligations it has accepted and the programme it has ended.
What the investigation found
From 2016 to 2024, GM enrolled millions of drivers in its Smart Driver programme, which tracked how they drove. According to the attorney general, GM pitched it as a way for drivers to improve their own safety and said data would not go to insurers without express consent. The investigation found that GM sold the information to data brokers under contracts specifying that it was for insurance products, and that drivers were not told.
The data was specific, the office says. Insurers could see how often a person drove, when each trip began and ended, how many times they braked or accelerated hard, and whether they exceeded the speed limit. Insurers could then change a driver's premium on that basis, and in some cases raised it. GM discontinued Smart Driver after a newspaper reported on the practices.
Sign-ups and the OnStar error
Most customers joined at the dealership when buying a car, through a single sign-up that covered both Smart Driver and OnStar services. Dealership staff allegedly accepted the terms on customers' behalf without their consent, at a time when GM was rewarding dealerships and sales staff for high connected-services enrolment.
The attorney general also says GM's own systems let drivers down. The OnStar app wrongly told over 370,000 drivers they were not enrolled in Smart Driver when they were, and GM was collecting and selling their data. GM later unenrolled those drivers without telling them about the mistake, according to the office, and their data stayed with brokers and insurers.
What GM has agreed to
Under the settlement, GM must obtain affirmative express consent before it collects or discloses consumer driving and location data. It must limit the driving data it collects, run a comprehensive data privacy programme with internal and external assessments, and accept oversight and training requirements at its dealerships to stop customers being enrolled without consent.
Attorney General Nick Brown said drivers should always control how their data is used, and described the agreement as bipartisan. His office calls the terms significantly stronger than any other resolution reached with GM over this conduct.
