My OBD2 adapter interferes with OnStar's ability to read data from my vehicle. That's why I try to make it a point remove it every now and then.
As do I to see if my cars OnStar problem miraculously fixes itself. But that really has nothing to do with you citing that as a reason for suspecting that the author might have done something to the car to cause his batteries to fail (and was committing warranty fraud).
Her words were probably accurate. What she's been quoted as saying (what she did say) has been repeated without the context of the question that she was answering. The original article that shared her quote fully acknowledged that they didn't have access to the interviewer's question, and the question was most likely posed as a question about battery replacements due to degradation.
The battery recall and replacement is a well-known and highly publicized story. There would be no reason for Mary Barra to lie about it.
It's possible that her words were technically accurate if in context but there's no escaping the fact that the answer was misleading. Even if the interviewer asked specifically about degradation instead of reliability an answer of "we've never replaced a battery (for degradation)" only says they have never had a Bolt or Volt lose more than 40% of it's battery capacity. It would be like saying I've never been convicted of a DUI and using that to suggest that I was a safe driver.
I'm just pointing out all of the coincidences (which have an astronomically low probability). The author basically acknowledged that he had been using an OBD2 interface, which could interfere with the car's software. Given the fact that both Nissan and Tesla have had issues with their BMS programming recently, it's quite clear that these systems are very sensitive.
Sorry this is just equine excrement, in fact it's the kind of tortured reasoning you often hear people make when trying to defend certain politicians when they have done something indefensible.
The simple fact is that GM provides very little in the way of information about our cars including energy usage and environmental/system conditions and pretty much anyone who's well informed about modern vehicles is going to know about OBD interfaces and apps like Torque. FTR Torque Pro has 1M purchases and installs in the Play Store, Torque Lite has over 10M. OBD to Bluetooth adapters are very popular on Amazon, these are all commonly used tools and I have never once heard of
any carmaker even suggesting that it's a bad idea to use them. Nor have I heard of one ever causing problems with any vehicle.
In any case I run with Torque Pro 95% of the time and have for the better part of a year, I have a 2017 Bolt and am yet to have the first BMS update done. And if you might suggest that my "OBD Adapter" use is the reason my OnStar stopped working, my OnStar stopped working more than 2 months before I started using it. In fact the OnStar problem is what inspired me to dig my old OBD adapter out of the drawer where it had been sitting for several years.
