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Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilgers filed a lawsuit this week alleging General Motors and its telematics service provider OnStar collected driving data without consumers’ knowledge or consent to create driving scores that were later sold to insurance companies and used to raise rates.

The alleges GM installed telematics systems in its vehicles that tracked a wide array of data points, including speed, seatbelt usage, driving habits, and location.

GM then entered into agreements with third-party companies requiring them to create “telematics exchanges”鈥攄atabases housing the collected Driving Data, the lawsuit says. Under these agreements, the third parties could then use that data to calculate and assign a driving score.

A driving score includes personally identifiable information for each GM customer using risk factors developed by the automaker. Risk factors GM considered negative included late night driving, driver and passenger seatbelt status, and instances of sharp turns, hard braking, hard acceleration, and driving over eighty miles per hour, the lawsuit says.

GM allegedly required these third parties to sell car insurance companies access to the telematics exchanges. After buying access, these insurers could access the driving scores of more than sixteen million drivers of GM vehicles.

Related: Suit Says OnStar, LexisNexis Shared Driving Data With Insurers, Spiking Rates

Those insurers allegedly then used the driving scores and to make decisions about consumers’ insurance, including increasing insurance premiums, canceling existing insureds’ coverage, or denying coverage entirely.

“Nebraskans deserve to work with companies that are truthful and honest about what they are doing,” Hilgers said. “That is not what happened here, and we filed this lawsuit because one large company decided that it wouldn’t honestly tell Nebraskans that their data was going to be used to impact their insurance rates. This is wrong. Our office will hold companies that mislead Nebraskans accountable, no matter how large.”

The lawsuit alleges GM deceived customers at the point of sale by misrepresenting the scope of its OnStar telematics services. Customers allegedly were often misled to believe enrollment in OnStar was mandatory to access basic safety features.

Additionally, dealerships were incentivized to enroll customers in OnStar without proper disclosure, and, in some cases, without any consent at all, the lawsuit alleges.

The complaint seeks civil penalties and restitution for impacted Nebraska drivers.

Topics Lawsuits Personal Auto