The impact of data complexity on privacy management in vehicle to infrastructure applications

In recent years, privacy management has become one of the most complex processes in the connected world. Fundamental technologies like GPS, cellular communications, and the Internet have become essential equipment in the modern vehicle. Subsequently, the vehicle became part of this connected world, wherein data are constantly sent and received. Accordingly, it became inevitable to introduce data security to vehicular communication. Hence, the development of location based and other connected services introduced a new level of data complexity. In scenarios where GPS data are tied to certain entities or databases consisting of entire personal profiles, data cannot be treated separately anymore. Prior improvements regarding privacy protection achieved through anonymous pseudonyms have become negligible due to GPS and cellular enabled traceability. This paper presents a new approach that turns privacy protection from a one-way street into a negotiation process. It allows the user to individually decide what data is provided and what is kept private.