Yes, Big Brother will be riding with you. Like Steppenwolf sang so many years ago:
“There’s a monster on the loose … and he just sits there watching.”
A bill already passed by the Senate and set to be rubber stamped by the House would make it mandatory for all new cars in the United States to be fitted with black box data recorders from 2015 onwards.
This is the legislation reported in the NY Daily News this past January.
The text from the relevant section of the proposed law … (you got to pass it to see what’s in it!)
S. 1813 – ‘Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act’ or the ‘MAP-21’
SEC. 31406. VEHICLE EVENT DATA RECORDERS.
(a) Mandatory Event Data Recorders-
(1) IN GENERAL- Not later than 180 days after the date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary shall revise part 563 of title 49, Code of Federal Regulations, to require, beginning with model year 2015, that new passenger motor vehicles sold in the United States be equipped with an event data recorder that meets the requirements under that part.
(2) PENALTY- The violation of any provision under part 563 of title 49, Code of Federal Regulations–
(A) shall be deemed to be a violation of section 30112 of title 49, United States Code;
(B) shall be subject to civil penalties under section 30165(a) of that title; and
(C) shall not subject a manufacturer (as defined in section 30102(a)(5) of that title) to the requirements under section 30120 of that title.
(b) Limitations on Information Retrieval-
(1) OWNERSHIP OF DATA- Any data in an event data recorder required under part 563 of title 49, Code of Federal Regulations, regardless of when the passenger motor vehicle in which it is installed was manufactured, is the property of the owner, or in the case of a leased vehicle, the lessee of the passenger motor vehicle in which the data recorder is installed.
(2) PRIVACY- Data recorded or transmitted by such a data recorder may not be retrieved by a person other than the owner or lessee of the motor vehicle in which the recorder is installed unless–
(A) a court authorizes retrieval of the information in furtherance of a legal proceeding;
(B) the owner or lessee consents to the retrieval of the information for any purpose, including the purpose of diagnosing, servicing, or repairing the motor vehicle;
(C) the information is retrieved pursuant to an investigation or inspection authorized under section 1131(a) or 30166 of title 49, United States Code, and the personally identifiable information of the owner, lessee, or driver of the vehicle and the vehicle identification number is not disclosed in connection with the retrieved information; or
(D) the information is retrieved for the purpose of determining the need for, or facilitating, emergency medical response in response to a motor vehicle crash.
(c) Report to Congress- Two years after the date of implementation of subsection (a), the Secretary shall study the safety impact and the impact on individual privacy of event data recorders in passenger motor vehicles and report its findings to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation of the Senate and the Committee on Energy and Commerce of the House of Representatives. The report shall include–
(1) the safety benefits gained from installation of event data recorders;
(2) the recommendations on what, if any, additional data the event data recorder should be modified to record;
(3) the additional safety benefit such information would yield;
(4) the estimated cost to manufacturers to implement the new enhancements;
(5) an analysis of how the information proposed to be recorded by an event data recorder conforms to applicable legal, regulatory, and policy requirements regarding privacy;
(6) a determination of the risks and effects of collecting and maintaining the information proposed to be recorded by an event data recorder;
(7) an examination and evaluation of the protections and alternative processes for handling information recorded by an event data recorder to mitigate potential privacy risks.
(d) Revised Requirements for Event Data Recorders- Based on the findings of the study under subsection (c), the Secretary shall initiate a rulemaking proceeding to revise part 563 of title 49, Code of Federal Regulations. The rule–
(1) shall require event data recorders to capture and store data related to motor vehicle safety covering a reasonable time period before, during, and after a motor vehicle crash or airbag deployment, including a rollover;
(2) shall require that data stored on such event data recorders be accessible, regardless of vehicle manufacturer or model, with commercially available equipment in a specified data format;
(3) shall establish requirements for preventing unauthorized access to the data stored on an event data recorder in order to protect the security, integrity, and authenticity of the data; and
(4) may require an interoperable data access port to facilitate universal accessibility and analysis.
(e) Disclosure of Existence and Purpose of Event Data Recorder- The rule issued under subsection (d) shall require that any owner’s manual or similar documentation provided to the first purchaser of a passenger motor vehicle for purposes other than resale–
(1) disclose that the vehicle is equipped with such a data recorder; and
(2) explain the purpose of the data recorder.
(f) Access to Event Data Recorders in Agency Investigations- Section 30166(c)(3)(C) of title 49, United States Code, is amended by inserting ‘, including any electronic data contained within the vehicle’s diagnostic system or event data recorder’ after ‘equipment.’
(g) Deadline for Rulemaking- The Secretary shall issue a final rule under subsection (d) not later than 4 years after the date of enactment of this Act.
The song “Monster” from Steppenwolf is worth a “refresher”…
If this seems a ‘little hippie’ for your taste, just remember that we have a common enemy in our National government:
STATISM and LIBERTY cannot coexist … one must perish !
