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All Cars Sold in the EU Now Require a Camera Aimed at Your Face. It’s Still Not Clear Where That Data Goes (allaboutcookies.org)
submitted 4 months ago by to c/privacy@programming.dev
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Starting July 7, 2026, every new car sold in the European Union must include a driver monitoring camera aimed at your face. Glance at your phone, your kids in the back seat, or the radio for too long, and the car will flash a warning light and sound an alert.

Automakers have known this was coming for years. What they, and EU regulators, have never spelled out is what happens to that footage after the alert goes off.

While the intention behind the new system is difficult to dispute, its implementation has raised several concerns. Early real-world testing suggests the distraction warnings can be overly sensitive and potentially distracting.

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[–] 5 points 4 months ago* (6 children)

Starting July 7, 2026, every new car sold in the European Union must include a driver monitoring camera aimed at your face

Patently false. The rule says nothing about how the ADDW system must function. All the sites claiming that a camera is even required are completely making shit up.

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2019/2144/oj/eng

It is merely defined as:

‘advanced emergency braking system’ means a system which can automatically detect a potential collision and activate the vehicle braking system to decelerate the vehicle with the purpose of avoiding or mitigating a collision;

It's up to each individual manufacturer to design a system that fulfills that purpose, however they feel like doing it.

Please stop spreading misinformation.

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  • [–] 11 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (4 children)

    Thats not the addw section (at least in the version im reading) but otherwise you are correct

    Driver drowsiness and attention warning and advanced driver distraction warning systems shall be designed in such a way that those systems do not continuously record nor retain any data other than what is necessary in relation to the purposes for which they were collected or otherwise processed within the closed-loop system. Furthermore, those data shall not be accessible or made available to third parties at any time and shall be immediately deleted after processing. Those systems shall also be designed to avoid overlap and shall not prompt the driver separately and concurrently or in a confusing manner where one action triggers both systems.

    I maintain my stance that this is one of those "small steps" towards something much worse and that manufacturers will absolutely find a way around this to monetise it somehow (even in it's current form)

    But I suppose we'll see.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago (3 children)

    Wait until the cotton gin arrives, all the hand weavers will become jobless and no one will have experience anymore.

    Wait until the printing press arrives, all the scribe monks will become jobless and no one will have experience anymore.

    Wait until the computer arrives, people will become obsolete and no one will have experience anymore.

    Wait until the steam engine, automobiles, planes, calculators, telephones, bla bla

    "Slippery slope" arguments like these assume that once a technology introduces a specific risk, society lacks the agency to create counter-measures, new norms, or alternative uses for that technology.

    History shows that when a "slope" appears, regulation steps in, technology evolves to solve the problem, or the culture shifts to reinterpret the tool.

    In almost every case, the feared "bottom" of the slope was never reached because humans constantly built ramps or bridges along the way.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 months ago (2 children)

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window

    Just because the baseline has shifted doesn't mean the change never happened , it just means we collectively haven't noticed as much as we could have, because the change sometimes happens at a timeframe larger than our collective memory.

    That the "absolute worst" didn't come to pass doesn't negate the change that did occur.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago* (1 child)

    Just because the baseline has shifted doesn’t mean the change never happened

    There can and will be change, sure, but my point was that OP's "smalls steps towards something much worse" typically never happens because of the shift.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago

    The "small steps" comment was me.

    The shift described in the overton window is the shift in the perception of normal.

    If 5 steps down are taken, then the window shifts, followed by another 5 downward steps, you're still down 10 steps from where you started.

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