Insurer Admiral’s new insurance scheme aims to decipher what kind of driver you are based on your social media interactions.

The cost of insurance to new drivers is crippling but there are now many incentives available to help drive down cost of insurance premiums from carmaker incentives to black boxes that monitor your driving behaviour. Admiral Insurance though thinks it can go one better by offering discounts based on your Facebook history.

Yes, you read that right. The company is trialling its ‘firstcarquote’ scheme designed to bring down the price of insurance premiums for first-time car buyers/drivers by between £180 and £350. And at the heart of how the scheme operates is your Facebook page.

Once you have given them access to your page, the company claims that by viewing your posting history, it can tell what kind of driver you are. Admiral claims that by analysing what you write and like – even the sports stars you follow could have an impact – the insurer can categorise your driving ability and style. Categorisations include ‘bold and daring’ (we assume that’s not good), ‘cautious and reliable’ and ‘balanced and easygoing’.

The system has been developed by psychology expert Dr. Yossi Borenstein who said: “By looking into the social data and how people write and express themselves you can predict their personality type. For example, overconfident people might use words like ‘always’ or ‘never’.

“Uneasy drivers are likely to use more negative emotions, so more words like ‘maybe’ or ‘perhaps’, which suggest that they are so not confident. You can infer a few things about personality, and from the personality we can conclude how safe you’re likely to be.’

While we’ll leave you to decide whether such a service is intrusive or not, Admiral is quick to point out that the scheme is strictly voluntary and will only trigger a potential discount, never a hike in premiums. The use of Facebook data though has alarmed some privacy groups and critically, Admiral might face an even bigger problem – Facebook itself who has intervened and blocked the insurance company’s plans for now. Admiral though says that it is “working closely with Facebook in Europe to get the service ready, and are now addressing a few outstanding issues”.

While the two parties hammer out the details, we have to wonder just how open new drivers will be to handing over their Facebook details to get cheaper car insurance.

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