Emerging Privacy and Trust Issues for Autonomous Vehicle Systems

In the awakening of cutting-edge technology, companies such as Apple, Waymo, and Tesla are racing to launch the industry’s first fully autonomous car. Besides the technical challenges such as safety and infrastructure, privacy and data protection have attracted the autonomous vehicle industry and researchers’ attention. In particular, it is hard for autonomous vehicle manufacturers to impose substantive privacy and security protections when different vendors and suppliers are involved in vehicle production. Although we know how much data autonomous vehicles will generate per day, there is a lack of knowledge of how the collected data will be used (e.g., real-time broadcasting and offline analytic). The privacy risks associated with data collection raise individual concerns in autonomous vehicle systems. For instance, when location information is combined with personal information, a person’s details such as wealth status, profession, sexual association, and religion can be deduced. The misuse of present and historical travel patterns also puts someone susceptible to physical harm or stalking. Driven by mutual benefits or regulations, specific data must be shared in real-time or published for analysis or research purposes. This paper discusses the emerging privacy and trust issues that are essential to motivate the acceptance of autonomous vehicles operating on public roads.