GM Pays $220 Million Over Selling Drivers' Habits to Insurers

General Motors will hand over $220 million to close out allegations that it quietly sold drivers’ behavioral and location data to brokers — a payout agreed with a coalition of 36 state attorneys general.

The settlement, first reported by Reuters, also forces the automaker to scale back what it gathers in the first place. Going forward, GM must secure “express consent” from vehicle owners before collecting their information. That is a meaningful shift for a company that once treated data harvesting as a standard feature.

What Smart Driver Actually Did

At the center of the case sits Smart Driver, a GM program that has since been discontinued. It logged how people drove — throttle inputs, braking events, trip distances — and, according to the states, funneled that material to data brokers. Insurers could then buy it and adjust premiums accordingly.

The attorneys general went further, arguing that many drivers had no idea they were enrolled or that their cars were reporting on them.

What the states alleged: GM collected acceleration, braking and trip-length data, passed it to brokers, and never clearly told drivers it was happening.

Oregon AG Dan Rayfield and Washington AG Nick Brown led the multi-state action, joined by New York, Florida, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and dozens of others.

Rayfield framed the outcome bluntly in a statement, saying a purchase should not come with surveillance attached — and that some owners ended up paying more for insurance because of data they never agreed to share.

A Pattern, Not a One-Off

The $220 million figure lands only months after GM settled related California claims for **$12.75 million**. Two payouts, same underlying complaint.

• Consent first: GM must obtain explicit approval before harvesting driver data.
• Collection limits: The program’s scope gets trimmed beyond the shutdown of Smart Driver itself.
• State reach: 36 attorneys general signed on, spanning nearly every region of the country.

For EV and software-defined car owners, the case cuts close to home. Modern vehicles generate a constant stream of telemetry, and connected services are only expanding. Whether drivers can see and control that flow is becoming as relevant as range or charging speed.

GM has not signaled how the consent requirement will be implemented across its fleet. But the message from state regulators is clear enough: the dashboard is not a data pipeline by default.