PeutMieuxFaire

Valid point, no offense taken. I did not think about the airbags! As for damages to the vehicle, this is something I understand an am willing to accept. If I do stupid things I have to face consequences.
Anyway, getting the help of a mechanic would be point number 1 on my list. If can find one willing to take the challenge :)

Thanks! Knowing that what I might be searching for would be somewhere under the dashboard is a good first step.

Then I am not an engineer nor have any experience in electronics BUT I know from my dad that taking the dashboard apart is not an easy task. If I would succeed I do not know what I would be looking for… Would tan antenna look like a piece of wire? Or could it be embedded in the ‘copper’ circuitry of a PCB? Do cars use regular SIM cards like the ones found in phones or would they look different?

The maintenance manual would probably be a good place to start before trying to put anything apart.

For recent cars I am afraid you are right. My current and “old” car has a built in navigation system with the map on an SD-card. No need for a connection to a smartphone - which I do not own. Therefore I suppose it is not communicating with the manufacturer.

Then, someone in my family with a more recent car got several “firmware updates” out of the blue, hinting to a ‘permanent’ connection to the manufacturer.

I have the feeling we need to start organizing and claim a “right to disconnection”. Having the car dial for help after a crash is one thing but what Mozilla’s report describes is at another, much higher level.

Thanks a lot for your post ! The future of cars looks grim.

Serious and naive question: how could I get rid of the tracking at the hardware level when I will have no choice other than to buy a connected car?
Is there an antenna or a SIM card somewhere that I could disconnect/remove? Would the car continue to work if the connection to the manufacturer’s server is lost?

Yup: write down the password when you set up the software and feed it to your “own” RustDesk on your computer.
Although I recently had a case where the password on the remote machine seemed to have changed by its own, but it could be me or the machine owner who did something funny without noticing.

+1. I use it to help non-tech relatives. Apparently works on different OSes, including Android.
Install, setup password, create icon on desktop and name it “Help me” - Done.

Do you wish to submit me to a Turing test? I am sure at 92.82293 % that I could demonstrate my appartenance to your species.