Are Insurance OBD Plug in Monitors Destroying Cars? Let’s Discuss

A number of insurance companies offer devices that one can use in their vehicle in order to potentially lower their rates. Essentially, the purpose of the device is to track the car and see how the driver is behaving on the roadways.

There are several different versions of devices that carry out this process. Nowadays, some companies offer GPS units that are simply placed in the car. However, other units are plugged into the vehicle’s onboard diagnostic (OBD) port and used to trace every single input that the driver levees on the vehicle.

Now, there is a big debate about if there’s really a whole lot to gain from using a device like this or what the insurance company’s endgame is with this data. However, that’s not what we’re here to talk about this time.

Instead, there have been claims that these insurance OBD plug-in devices are, in fact, destroying cars, potentially by shorting things out. One user claimed that they plugged the device into their OBD port and very shortly after, their vehicle died and wouldn’t start up again.

This time, we check in with automotive YouTuber, Scotty Kilmer, as he talks a little bit about what it means to take such a device and plug it into your OBD port all the time and leave it in instead of using the port as he says it was intended, for quick diagnostics.

Below, we get the full rundown on if you should use these sorts of devices from a mechanical standpoint. The video also takes a moment to dive into a couple of other ways that people can potentially ruin their cars. At the end of the day, this is a good one to check in with and make sure that you have some of these concepts in the back of your mind the next time that you head out on the road.