# Is it possible to buy a new car that doesn't track you? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 10, 2025, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843 "2025-10-10T07:29:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/1 "2025-10-10T07:29:36Z")
I was reading recently about insurance companies buying flawed information from OnStar and unfairly raising people’s insurance rates. It got me wondering, is there any modern car brand that doesn’t include a tracking feature? Is there one that can be reliably turned off? ---
**Author:** ![kk\_fusion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kk_fusion/32/15276_2.png) [@kk\_fusion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kk_fusion)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/2 "2025-10-10T07:45:27Z")
I pulled the fuse for the shark-fin antenna to disable OnStar. That disables GPS as well, but the car should be un-trackable. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/3 "2025-10-10T14:22:18Z")
How do you tell which fuse? And, will you lose AM/FM radio? ---
**Author:** ![Gorsnak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gorsnak/32/7587_2.png) [@Gorsnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorsnak)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/4 "2025-10-10T14:24:05Z")
The owner’s manual should include a diagram of the fusebox. As to what else might be on that circuit, it likely varies. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/5 "2025-10-10T14:39:08Z")
Whatever car(s) you’re looking at, find a copy of the manual online. It may tell you exactly what you need to do disable location tracking. My car allows you to turn off ‘location sharing’ and ‘data sharing’. If you really wanted to kill all of this, I think your best bet would be to pull the fuse (or the sim card) for the modem. Also worth noting that you’ll almost certainly lose other features when you do this. Either because they need to be able to communicate, they’re on the same circuit as a fuse you pulled or because the manufacturer is ‘punishing’ you for taking away some of their data. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/6 "2025-10-10T14:41:52Z")
You would also have to find out if the location and/or car tracker can be turned back on remotely. ---
**Author:** ![control-z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@control-z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/control-z)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/7 "2025-10-10T15:35:18Z")
If I buy a modern vehicle I too am hoping I can disable the cellular modem without disabling GPS/navigation. I believe cellular modems are what allows your car to transmit data, GPS is a receive-only system, nothing is transmitted. It may get tricky if the module or antenna is shared between cellular and GPS though. Whether and how disabling the tracking can be done will vary with every vehicle. Unplugging a module seems to work on Ford Mavericks: [https://old.reddit.com/r/FordMaverickTruck/comments/oxx2ld/2022\_ford\_maverick\_owners\_manual\_832021/h7q7bzx/](https://www.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/1fob4ph/safely_disable_the_tcu_cellular_connectivity_on/) ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/8 "2025-10-10T15:44:59Z")
Don’t these cellular modems usually have older 3G/4G SIM cards as well? If they’re still physical (as opposed to an eSIM), could you just pull the SIM card out? Presumably then the _government_ could still track your modem itself via the cell towers, but the car company & insurance could not, because there would no longer be an active account associated with the car and actively transmitting telemetry. ---
**Author:** ![kk\_fusion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kk_fusion/32/15276_2.png) [@kk\_fusion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kk_fusion)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/9 "2025-10-10T15:48:22Z")
It’s in the manual. And radio still working normally; that doesn’t require a _powered_ antenna. ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/10 "2025-10-10T15:52:27Z")
> [@control-z](#): > > GPS is a receive-only system, nothing is transmitted. I Well, they SAY that… In seriousness, I presume you’re right, based on my utter ignorance, but these days, how can one tell? ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/11 "2025-10-10T15:52:45Z")
> [@kk\_fusion](#): > > It’s in the manual. And radio still working normally; that doesn’t require a _powered_ antenna. (Not doubting you, I just don’t know how these things are usually connected) Is the AM/FM radio typically a separate antenna altogether, not part of the “shark fin”? Otherwise, if they’re sharing the same antenna… wouldn’t pulling the fuse break the circuit altogether (and thus fail to be an antenna any longer, with or without “active” power)? ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/12 "2025-10-10T16:01:28Z")
> [@Kropotkin](#): > > In seriousness, I presume you’re right, based on my utter ignorance, but these days, how can one tell? Well, battery, power, and transmitter/antenna. You can’t easily just “fake” something that can transmit to space (or anywhere); you need specialized equipment. GPS is a satellite system that broadcasts all around the world, and any receiver (off-the-shelf or homebuilt) can receive those signals. They work via trilateration, timing the differences between several satellite signals at the same time. We know this is how they work because you can [build your own GPS receiver](https://hackaday.com/2024/01/02/building-a-gps-receiver-from-the-ground-up/) without having to transmit anything back. So to go from that to active tracking, your car has to not only receive the GPS signal, but then re-transmit your location elsewhere (usually via cellular modem). That means it’s not the GPS system that’s tracking you, but another device in the car that’s re-transmitting your GPS location via its own modem. Granted, some cell phones CAN now transmit back to satellites, but even then they’re not transmitting to GPS satellites, but to other ones specifically used for communications and texting, or lower-flying Starlink clusters. In any case, those all require additional transmission equipment and power. And if it draws power from the car, then a fuse should disconnect it. That doesn’t altogether _disprove_ the possibility of active trackers being installed. Not only do most new cars come with them, dealers and rental agencies have sometimes been known to add and leave aftermarket trackers inside cars they’ve sold, e.g. [1](https://www.motorbiscuit.com/dealership-install-tracker-car/) or [2](https://theautowire.com/2024/06/17/toyota-customer-claims-dealer-installed-gps-tracker/). But in those cases, they had to go _out of their way_ to deliberately (and secretly, and possibly illegally) do so. ---
**Author:** ![kk\_fusion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kk_fusion/32/15276_2.png) [@kk\_fusion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kk_fusion)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/13 "2025-10-10T16:05:25Z")
> [@Reply](#): > > Is the AM/FM radio typically a separate antenna altogether, not part of the “shark fin”? Otherwise, if they’re sharing the same antenna… wouldn’t pulling the fuse break the circuit altogether (and thus fail to be an antenna any longer, with or without “active” power)? I don’t know either. There might be an uninterruptable wire from the shark fin to the console (there weren’t any fuses back in the day when radios were just that, right?), or the receptor for AM/FM might be somewhere else in the frame. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/14 "2025-10-10T17:11:08Z")
Need answer fast? ---
**Author:** ![FlikTheBlue](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fliktheblue/32/10972_2.png) [@FlikTheBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlikTheBlue)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/15 "2025-10-10T18:04:08Z")
The other thing to consider is that with traffic cameras, toll road cameras, etc., being in most places, it’s still possible (and I suspect it’s likely pretty easy) to track any car, whether they are transmitting their location or not. ---
**Author:** ![kk\_fusion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kk_fusion/32/15276_2.png) [@kk\_fusion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kk_fusion)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/16 "2025-10-10T18:29:56Z")
True, but that’s the kind of surveillance _by traffic authorities_ that you (have to) consent to by participating in motorized traffic. None of that is the business of OnStar or your car dealer. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/17 "2025-10-10T18:29:59Z")
> [@FlikTheBlue](#): > > it’s still possible (and I suspect it’s likely pretty easy) to track any car Does anybody remember **[Dzhokhar Dudayev](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dzhokhar_Dudayev)**, who became president of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria after a referendum in October 1991, and unilaterally declared the republic’s independence from the Soviet Union? From the wikiarticle > On 21 April 1996, while using a satellite phone, Dudayev was assassinated by two laser-guided missiles, after his location was detected by a Russian reconnaissance aircraft, which intercepted his phone call. If the Russians could do that in 1996, imagine what a digitally competent government can find out in real time today. Or Palantir, or Tesla, or your boss. Feel free to become paranoid. ETA: But of course, the really worrying thing to bear in mind is that your insurance costs may rise. ---
**Author:** ![echoreply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/echoreply/32/3641_2.png) [@echoreply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/echoreply)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/18 "2025-10-10T18:54:55Z")
> [@kk\_fusion](#): > > that’s the kind of surveillance _by traffic authorities_ that you (have to) consent to by participating in motorized traffic Or surveillance from HOAs, schools, or anyone else that can pay a few thousand + subscription to have a license plate reading camera installed. If your goal is to not be tracked by the government, then you will have to find an alternative means of transportation. If the goal is to simply not be tracked by the manufacturer of your car, then the advice given so far is probably all that is necessary. Opt-out wherever possible, and if you don’t trust that, disable the cellular modem in the car (and don’t let it connect to wifi). ---
**Author:** ![Toxgoddess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Toxgoddess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Toxgoddess)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/19 "2025-10-10T19:05:41Z")
And leave your cell phone home. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2025, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843/20 "2025-10-10T19:45:17Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > I was reading recently about insurance companies buying flawed information from OnStar OnStar has been mostly discontinued, and the tracking part is gone now. GM/OnStar can no longer share such info- > **[FTC Takes Action Against General Motors for Sharing Drivers’ Precise Location...](https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2025/01/ftc-takes-action-against-general-motors-sharing-drivers-precise-location-driving-behavior-data)** > > The Federal Trade Commission is taking action against General Motors (GM) and OnStar over allegations they collected, used, and sold drivers’ precise geolocation data and driving behavior informati [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-buy-a-new-car-that-doesnt-track-you/1023843.md?page=2)