Patent ID: 8279083

Claim:
A vehicle information communication method comprising: collecting at least one of host vehicle probe data and surrounding vehicle probe data in a host vehicle; preparing at least one of a host vehicle common message set by associating the host vehicle probe data with host vehicle identifying information and a surrounding vehicle common message set associating the surrounding vehicle probe data with surrounding vehicle identifying information; transmitting the at least one of the host vehicle common message set and the surrounding vehicle common message set from the host vehicle to a carrier vehicle; disassociating the host vehicle identifying information from the host vehicle common message set in response to the host vehicle common message set being prepared and transmitted and disassociating the surrounding vehicle identifying information from the surrounding vehicle common message set in response to the surrounding vehicle common message set being prepared and transmitted, the disassociating occurring after transmission from the host vehicle; and transmitting the at least one of the host vehicle probe data and the surrounding vehicle probe data from the carrier vehicle after disassociating at least one corresponding identifying information of the host vehicle identifying information and the surrounding vehicle identifying information from the at least one of the host vehicle common message set and the surrounding vehicle common message set to an external communication device when the carrier vehicle is within a communication area of the external communication device, the disassociating of the at least one corresponding identifying information from the at least one of the host vehicle common message set and the surrounding vehicle common message set further including replacing the at least one corresponding identifying information with carrier vehicle identifying information.