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WASHINGTON – After privacy concerns were raised, three Republican senators, including Texan John Cornyn, have introduced legislation to develop advanced drunk driving prevention technology and repeal a provision requiring its use in all new passenger cars.
The provision of drunk driving technology was celebrated last fall by advocacy groups like Mothers Against Drunk Driving and Highway and Auto Safety Advocates, which President Joe Biden signed as part of the $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
But it became a point of contention for some Republicans worried about potential invasions of privacy from new technology — in cars, gadgets or otherwise — used in millions of American households.
A provision in the infrastructure bill would give federal regulators at least three years to decide what technology would be required as part of the new vehicle standard, and automakers would then have two more years to implement that standard in their vehicles.
Cornyn’s press secretary, Natalie Yzbik, said the senior Texas senator supports many of the measures already in place to prevent drunk driving, such as driver’s license breathalyzers and ignition interlock devices in the vehicles of convicted felons.
However, the senator is concerned about the federal government’s broad and unchecked power over vehicles that could easily infringe on the privacy rights of law-abiding citizens, Yazbic said in a statement. Dallas Morning News.
Cornyn, a sponsor of the Republican-led legislation titled Protecting Your Car’s Privacy Act of 2022 and sponsored by Sen. Mike Rounds, RS.D. Introduced, he is not alone in his preconceptions.
After it passed in November, a senior policy analyst at the American Civil Liberties Union said the provision would give the Transportation Department greater latitude in developing and implementing technology that could pose “privacy risks.”
Albert Fox Kahn, founder and executive director of the Surveillance Technology Surveillance Project Oversight Group, and Nina Loshkajian, one of the group’s legal colleagues, wrote in an op-ed for The hill “Such a surveillance order is invasive, partisan and ultimately unconstitutional.” It won’t work.”
But in the year For people like Fairview resident Steve Mason, who has volunteered with MADD since his son Chris died in a drunken driving accident in 2005, privacy concerns are a hurdle that can and should be overcome in getting the preventative technology into cars.
Mason first beat Rounds, Cornyn and Sen. Mike Braun, R-Ind., noted that he had introduced legislation to repeal the provision. [his] Blood will flow.
Mason said every time he reads about a drunken car accident, he thinks about his family.
“You can’t understand the impact it has had on our family and all the other families,” he said.
In the year In 2021, 1,100 people died and 2,560 were seriously injured in drunk driving crashes on Texas roads, according to the Texas Department of Transportation. In Texas, on average, someone dies every 7 hours and 57 minutes because of a DUI in an alcohol-related traffic accident.
Meanwhile, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, an independent nonprofit organization, estimates that systems in cars that limit a driver’s blood alcohol level below the legal limit could prevent more than 9,000 deaths a year.
Automakers are exploring a few different types of technology that can detect and prevent drunk driving, and Hyundai says it’s working on a smart cabin monitor that can detect drowsy driving.
Congress did not specify what kind of technology cars should include, except that they must be able to accurately detect drunk driving and must be “friendly.”
MDD believes that the provision in the infrastructure bill has the potential to ultimately eliminate drunk driving.
“It’s a complex rule, but we believe it will be the most important piece of safety legislation in terms of the lives that could be saved for the US Department of Transportation,” said MDD Chief of Government Affairs Stephanie Manning.
Manning said MDD has met with Cornyn’s staff to address the concerns and found ways to work through them.
“Let’s find a way to address these concerns. We don’t want to compromise anyone’s privacy, we don’t want information to be used in a way that puts anyone at risk,” Manning said. “We just want to prevent accidents from happening.”
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