A first look at vehicle data collection via smartphone sensors

Smartphones serve as a technical interface to the outside world. These devices have embedded, on-board sensors (such as accelerometers, WiFi, and GPSes) that can provide valuable information for investigating users´ needs and behavioral patterns. Similarly, computers that are embedded in vehicles are capable of collecting valuable sensor data that can be accessed by smartphones through the use of On-Board Diagnostics (OBD) sensors. This paper describes a prototype of a mobile computing platform that provides access to vehicles´ sensors by using smartphones and tablets, without compromising these devices´ security. Data such as speed, engine RPM, fuel consumption, GPS locations, etc. are collected from moving vehicles by using a WiFi On-Board Diagnostics (OBD) sensor, and then backhauled to a remote server for both real-time and offline analysis. We describe the design and implementation details of our platform, for which we developed a library for in-vehicle sensor access and created a non-relational database for scalable backend data storage. We propose that our data collection and visualization tools are useful for analyzing driving behaviors; we also discuss future applications, security, and privacy concerns specific to vehicular networks.