Jaguar Land Rover to pay drivers for intel

Australian owners of Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles could soon earn money for providing valuable intel on the conditions of the roads they drive as part of a pioneering new scheme launched by the British car-maker.

As a reward for monitoring and reporting heavy traffic or nasty potholes via its new technology, Jaguar Land Rover says its owners will earn cryptocurrency which can then be used to pay for coffee, tolls, charging and parking.

The thinking behind owner reporting is the information gathered will alert others to congestion or poor road surfaces, encouraging other users to divert onto different routes and provide for freer flowing traffic and lower tailpipe emissions.

The new tech, developed by JLR's software engineering centre in Ireland in partnership with communications developer IOTA, is already being trialled on a fleet of Jaguar F-PACE and Range Rover Velar teest vehicles that have been equipped with the smart wallet functionality.

JLR predicts that, once successfully signed off and in use by owners, more than 75 billion devices will be connected to the IOTA network by 2025 and the smart wallet will become a genuine cash and card replacement as it is faster than traditional payment methods without any fees.

JLR says that by allowing their vehicles to be part of the data-gathering process, its owners will help the car-maker take another step towards its aim of "zero emissions, zero accidents and zero congestion".

The new smart wallets and traffic and road conditions reporting tech follows on from a whole host of new tech being developed by the British car-maker, most recently including new software that accurately predicts red traffic lights to reduce time and fuel wasted while standing still.