The possibilities are manifold. Maintenance crews could find pothole-ridden areas based on suspension kinematics data, while salt crews could deduce which streets were especially icy using data from antilock braking or electronic stability systems, Baloga said.

Naturally, there’s another side to this: How much do you want on the public record about your car — and, by extension, your driving habits? It’s a legitimate concern, Baloga said, and the chief reason why the vast majority of data would remain anonymous.

“We in the auto industry are extremely hesitant to allow for our systems to be used for enforcement,” he said.

Extenuating circumstances — kidnappings or drunken drivers, for example — may create situations where society benefits more by crossing those boundaries, Baloga said. But by and large, “automakers are not focused on controlling that.”

It’s food for thought, at the very least. What do you think? Does the safety benefit potential in car-to-car communication outweigh privacy concerns?

[ http://blogs.cars.com/kickingtires/2009/02/bmw-studies-car-to-car-communication.html - blogs.cars.com ]