It wasn't me - the app told me to do it!

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I was having coffee the other day with a friend of mine. After we'd been chit-chatting a while, she mentioned something about how she now was 'breaking the law' to save a buck. I paused for a moment, unsure how to respond to this revelation. She then went on to explain that after trying her level best to cut costs to fight inflation, her household budget still wasn't working. Thus, she'd shopped around for cheaper car insurance. Finding none, she called her current company to try to haggle for a lower rate. They told her to download an app, they'd send her a thing to put in her car and she'd get a discount based on her driving patterns. Sounded easy enough to her, she'd never gotten a ticket or been in an accident, therefore, she had to be a great driver. Right? Turns out she was wrong. After a few days of using the app/thing in her car, she checked the app and discovered she had a really low score. Digging deeper into the information about the trips, she discovered she got low marks on braking. With a bit more research, she discovered it was when she stopped at traffic lights. So now she no longer tries to stop for yellow lights. Nope, she blows through them and admitted to me that more than a few are red by the time she's out of the intersection. But, hey her score has improved dramatically! 

My first instinct was to reply with something flippant like 'desperate times call for desperate measures.' Yet, as I reflected on her story, something more important hit me. How many other drivers are doing the exact same thing? Doing whatever they can to game the system to lower their insurance rates. And end up driving in a less than safe manner because some app thinks it's better. As I continued to sit, sipping on my drink, a new thought crossed my mind. The world has apparently entered a whole new level of grey area. We are relying on technology for almost too much, our homes have smart water meters, smart electric meters, smart speakers, smart lights, smart plugs, smart TVs. How far is too far in blurring the line between what is controlled by humans and what isn't? Personally, I don't think I want to know the answer to that. In the meantime, I'm going to be much more careful at intersections. 

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