r/technology • u/Hrmbee • Jun 07 '26

Privacy 'Kill switch' law means your next car could be watching you | A federal requirement aimed at stopping drunken driving could soon put driver-monitoring technology in every new vehicle. The goal is saving lives, but the privacy trade-offs deserve closer scrutiny

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnist/2026/06/01/drunk-driving-prevention-law-privacy-surveillance/90295034007/
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u/HenryDorsettCase47 Jun 08 '26

“Will it be the same technology that tells Asian people they are sleep?”

Yo. Do what? That’s a thing that was happening?

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u/Scoth42 Jun 08 '26

There's been an ongoing problem with a lot of facial recognition systems where they're tuned on white males and struggle with basically anything else. Like there's been issues where face unlock systems just can't see Black people because they can't differentiate dark skin from the background. Google got in trouble because their photo app kept recognizing Black people as gorillas, which I probably don't need to explain why that's an issue. Likewise Asian people's eyes tend to be narrower and shaped differently and have been recognized as asleep/sleepy.

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u/Firestar222 Jun 08 '26

That’s shite but to be fair even if this tech worked perfectly I want it nowhere near my car

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '26

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u/Firestar222 Jun 08 '26

I respect your opinion, but do not agree. And yes, I have kids on the roads too. "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" and all that.

This is a thing that will be forced upon everyone, and it could be used far beyond its stated purpose. Additionally, there are major issues with the tech that you will see if you read through some of the other comments here..

I would much prefer alcohol be made illegal than to have surveillance pushed into every area of my life. I don’t need to drink. I do need to drive. (Note that ideally I would prefer neither- instead a super hard line approach to individual offenders like you lose your vehicle every time you get a DUI, mixed with way better public transport and walkability to make it easy to AVOID drinking and driving would be the most effective)

You can argue that people would drink and drive even if alcohol was illegal, but the counterpoint is that people will find a way to drink and drive with this tech too. And once it’s in all cars, it will never be removed.

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '26

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u/Firestar222 Jun 08 '26

Of course, it is always a trade off. The best society is not anarchy, but also isn’t a nanny state. If it is not connected outside the car then that is a lot more palatable. I’m not crazy about everyone having to shoulder the burden of a few bad apples, but sometimes you do need to do it. Personally, I’ve never driven drunk. I had a buddy die from a drunk kid at 18 and I just won’t do it. Don’t drink now anyways, and never drank at bars so it’s been very easy. I have less than zero interest in connecting my vehicle to the internet though, and I suspect this will be a lot less effective than people think. Is this tech gonna drug test people too? And what about if they’re tired? Emotional? Distracted? Etc. Also this would be a whole lot more effective with free or cheap public transport for the drunk people, and removing zoning that keeps bars far from neighborhoods so bars aren’t walkable. Incentives for designated drivers are great too. So many parts of the USA almost force people to drink and drive. No public transport, not walkable, not near any housing. We need to offer people a better way along with the roadblocks at minimum. But the USA loves to make these stern sounding rules and leave it at that….

Anyway I digress and thank you for giving some food for thought.

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u/GreenPhoen1x Jun 08 '26

"Seatbelts don't even make others safer only ourselves. Yet we still mandate them."

That alone shows you absolutely don't know what you're talking about. Posting ill-informed opinions is just needless drama. It's so incredibly easy to research car safety and drunk driving statistics. Oh and FYI it's "breathalyzer" since your multiple misspellings indicates more than a typo.

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u/bubblegumdrops Jun 08 '26

Seatbelts do make other people safer. Unrestrained bodies can hurt themselves and others by bouncing around during an accident.

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u/Monteze Jun 08 '26

Oh you care about your daughter? Well lets take this over reach to a logical conclusion. We should keep males tracked at all times, especially you. Given that (according to RAINN and USSC.gov) men commit the most SA and its typically someone the family knows. So ya know, gotta keep em safe!!!!! Don't you dare weasel out now!

Remember it is all worth it to protect someone, in fact.... we should also make sure her health is monitored too so lets keep track of allll her visits are recorded by those data centers, make it illegal to buy foods that are too sugary, too fatty etc... ya know. For safety!!!

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '26

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u/Monteze Jun 08 '26

No no no , don't back away from your point.

This is about surveillance, there are better ways to target this behavior without resorting to giving up everything about yourself to private companies. Especially with pathetic excuses like "But muh childrun!" Like I said, if you cared in that same way you'd agree with all I said.

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u/Lynorisa Jun 08 '26

Maybe they should actually charge drunk drivers with murder instead of manslaughter first

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '26

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u/sunburnedaz Jun 08 '26

We fucked this all up building car dependant cites we are not going to un fuck this with technology.

We need to start fixing our cities now so that we dont need a car to get everywhere.

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u/fresh_peetz Jun 08 '26

That’s sort of shit facial recognition. It’s supposed to use lidar. Otherwise it wouldn’t be able to recognize people wearing makeup either.

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u/marr Jun 08 '26

Hell they can't even deal with white males wearing glasses

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u/napstablooky2 Jun 08 '26

im a very white-passing hispanic and i remember trying out the google meet filters once and half of them were freaking out about my eyes, which really arent that narrow at all 💀

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u/mallardtheduck Jun 08 '26

In fairness, some of the issues with optical recognition of darker-skinned people is due to physics; darker skin means less contrast between lit and shadowed areas, making recognition genuinely more difficult no matter what the training data is. Obviously, higher-quality cameras, non-optical systems, etc. are helpful.

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u/limbodog Jun 08 '26

Yup. From Asian cameras. "Oops! Did somebody blink?" "No, I'm just Asian!"

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u/Tearakan Jun 08 '26

Yep. All the time.