The U.S. Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is moving towards technology that allows cars to “talk” to each other, but there are still questions of when and how this can actually work.
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The DOT announced their plans last week to greenlight vehicle-to-vehicle communications systems that are designed to prevent car crashes. The V2V systems send anonymous data to surrounding vehicles that alerts drivers if there’s someone in their blind spot, slams on their breaks and similar scenarios. No deadline was given for when the connected cars will become mandatory, but public policy lawyers at K&L Gates speculate that the “NHTSA’s hesitancy to commit itself to this mandate may come from a lack of data or real world implementation of the technology, since the agency has historically only required safety features after they gained general acceptance within the automotive industry.”
While the DOT wraps up a year-long pilot program, questions of how invasive this program may be have already started to arise. There’s no standardization of how driver alerts are sent, which according Chris Davies from SlashGear, range from beeps, dashboard lights to on-screen notifications for built-in systems. The NHTSA already has rules for in-vehicle technology to reduce distracted driving, but the agency will still have to answer how the newer systems fit into current guidelines or if they will have to reissue them. It might not be that much of an issue because according to Jackie Glassman, partner at Hogan Lovells, the DOT has “broad authority to provide guidance on motor vehicle safety to consumers, private industry and other government agencies.”
There are also questions of privacy and system security. The DOT said that V2V systems will not broadcast drivers’ personal information, identifying car data or location, but there is the worry that information that is released – like speed – can be used against drivers, according to Thomas Claburn, editor of InformationWeek.
For instance, deploying police officers to catch speeders becomes unnecessary when cars broadcast their speed data 10 times a second — tickets could be emailed the moment a car exceeds the legal limit. Alternately, cars could have their speed limited to what the law allows, which would cut revenue from moving violation fines, leaving municipal leaders searching for new taxes to cover the shortfall. Or insurance companies might require speed limit compliance monitoring as a condition of a favorable rate, if the option to exceed speed limits remains in human hands.
While those are valid concerns, more pressing for the DOT is future of dedicated short-range communications (DSRC), which works similarly to Wi-Fi. In 1999, the Federal Communications Committee set aside the 5.9 GHz spectrum for V2V communication, which has been largely unused since the technology is not yet mainstream. The FCC is considering opening up the spectrum for broadcast and Wi-Fi uses, which would be bad news for the DOT, writes K&L Gates lawyers.
There is a significant debate over whether the spectrum may be used for DSRC and shared broadband uses, and V2V proponents are concerned with potential interference with vehicle safety communications from such unlicensed use. Further testing will be required before the issue can be resolved and will likely be prominently featured in the FCC’s 5 GHz proceeding in light of the DOT’s announcement and its upcoming V2V rulemaking.
The DOT’s plans are bold, but the biggest issue facing the agency is getting car companies on board. From pricing to logistics, manufacturers will have their own questions to contend with, but V2V will have no impact if the technology isn’t affordable and easily accessible for the majority of drivers.