I think these should be installed in cars in such a way that they can be removed by owners. And then make removing it a crime.
In the foreign invasion (or US govt goes full fascist) case, people can remove these devices.
Meanwhile many if not most high-speed chases won't happen any more, because the person being chased didn't plan ahead.
There will still be getaway cars, etc. where the device was removed. That's no different to what we have now, and it'll be an extra violation to charge them with when they're caught.
Since driving is, and has always been a privilege and not a right, I don't see a problem with having a remote kill switch that cops can use in specific cases.
Literally all rights are privileges and protections granted by the government.
It’s funny to read someone write “US goes full fascist” in a negative light while actively arguing to take away freedoms from law abiding Americans.
It’s already illegal to drink and drive. Now you want it to be illegal to modify vehicles?
Can I lobby to shut down vehicles who fail to use their turn signals?
I buy a car and remove the device immediately: how is the law enforced? Do cops check our equipment every time we get pulled over? Do we have to reinstall it for every smog check?
Who do I get to sue when I can’t bring my dad to the hospital because he had a heart attack after I had a glass of wine.
There’s a little risk in life, please learn to coexist with it and stop trying to force people to jump through hoops so you can feel a little safer.
> It’s already illegal to drink and drive. Now you want it to be illegal to modify vehicles?
I mean, it's hardly without precedent. You can't remove your license plate, you can't remove the seatbelts, you can't remove the muffler, you can't remove the catalytic converter, you can't remove the side or rear view mirrors. My state requires an annual inspection to confirm these things are all in place and working.
> Who do I get to sue when I can’t bring my dad to the hospital because he had a heart attack after I had a glass of wine.
General advice is that if it warrants drunk driving, it warrants a 911 call for an ambulance.
A glass of wine isn’t drunk driving. The concern is allowing a computer to make what could amount to life a death decisions.
I’m sure you can imagine that there are lots of people who live in different situations than you. Waiting for an ambulance might take several hours or may simply not show up. How about that it may cost several thousand dollars?
What happens when your fancy kill switch simply malfunctions and kills a car in a life and death location like a desert in the summer.
Please try to account for more than a suburban environment when passing national laws.
This is the kind of nanny law that pushes people to plug their nose and vote for the other guy.
Then it's unlikely your car will count it as such.
> The concern is allowing a computer to make what could amount to life a death decisions.
Your car does this continually. Should it fire the airbags? Tension the seatbelts? Engage the antilock brakes? Oops, one wheel is slipping, adjust power to the others.
> What happens when your fancy kill switch simply malfunctions and kills a car in a life and death location like a desert in the summer.
The same thing that happens if the starter or fuel pump or battery fails.
> This is the kind of nanny law that pushes people to plug their nose and vote for the other guy.
That's the evergreen threat of the folks who always find a reason to vote for the other guy anyways.
> You can't remove your license plate, you can't remove the seatbelts, you can't remove the muffler, you can't remove the catalytic converter, you can't remove the side or rear view mirrors
Of course you can. You just can’t drive it on public roads. Plenty of vehicles aren’t street legal.
This is a problem with many laws. For instance, we don’t allow people to commit mass shootings. But what if Zondar the Planet Eater gives me an ultimatum and only ten minutes to execute? “Kill all these children or I will eat the planet”. Straightforward choice to kill the kids. Then who do I sue? We should think about the unintended consequences of these things. After all, who wouldn’t want to make that deal with Zondar. He eats planets! Next they’ll make it illegal to save the planet!
If the fear is high-speed chases, maybe we need to also be considering when and how the police choose to give chase.
Are the criminals being pursued "active threats to life and limb?"-- someone in the middle of a spree killing deciding "I've cleaned out this area, gotta move to the next block?" Or are we seeing aggressive reaction to "self-contained" crimes-- drugs, robbery, a single assault, even kidnapping? Is the public actually made safer by creating a 20km long hazard zone for bystanders, rather than having a more deliberate monitoring and deployment process that waits for the target to stop before going for the capture?
It smells like the same sort of overkill obsession that leads to "one American traffic stop" using more bullets than "the entire police force of Germany in a year."
On the other hand, the song lyrics will be sort of funnier. Instead of "We put the sugar in the tank of the Sherrif's car", it will be "we spoofed the Sherrif's VIN and bricked his ignition".
> I think these should be installed in cars in such a way that they can be removed by owners. And then make removing it a crime.
no. they should not be installed at all. while were on this topic vehicles have WAY too much insecure crapware in them already, to the point where they can already be remotely controlled by hackers
> In July 2015, IT security researchers announced a severe security flaw assumed to affect every Chrysler vehicle with Uconnect produced from late 2013 to early 2015.[112] It allows hackers to gain access to the car over the Internet, and in the case of a Jeep Cherokee was demonstrated to enable an attacker to take control not just of the radio, A/C, and windshield wipers, but also of the car's steering, brakes and transmission.[112] Chrysler published a patch that car owners can download and install via a USB stick, or have a car dealer install for them.[112]
i don't know what people don't get, no matter how many times it happens it will not change: some company making a thing that communicates will always fuck it up beyond belief. they simply do not give a fuck about implementing it securely. a vehicle having software automatically means it will have severe vulnerabilities implemented in some stupid web scripting language by a kid who just arrived out of a shoddy college. did you miss the news or are you just coping by thinking "surely the 738th company to do IoT crap will do it right this time"
> Since driving is, and has always been a privilege and not a right, I don't see a problem with having a remote kill switch that cops can use in specific cases.
because you're just applying robotic reasoning to try and sound logically consistent while only knowing and focusing one one small part of law
> Meanwhile many if not most high-speed chases won't happen any more
High-speed chases don't happen anymore, unless you are talking about helicopter chases in uncontrolled airpsace. There has been no reason to chase a car for at least half a century.
That is, unless you have adrenaline-hungry cops that care more about having fun than actively hurting people. Car chases only happen if you don't criminally persecute cops for them.