Automakers attempt to restrict consumer inspections and repairs

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is fighting for vehicle owners' rights to inspect the code that runs their vehicles and to repair and modify their vehicles, or have a technician of their choice do the work. At the moment, the anti-circumvention prohibition in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act arguably restricts vehicle inspection, repair and modification. If EFF is successful, then vehicle owners will be free to inspect and "tinker," as long as they don’t run afoul of other regulations, such as those governing vehicle emissions, safety or copyright law, according to EFF.

Currently, many of the U.S. automakers have warned that owners with the freedom to inspect and modify code will be capable of violating a wide range of laws and harming themselves and others. According to the EFF, these automakers say consumers shouldn’t be allowed to repair their own vehicles because it might not be done right. They say the vehicle owners shouldn’t be allowed to modify a vehicle's code because they might use this tact to defraud a used car purchaser by changing the mileage. They also say no one should be allowed to even look at the code without the manufacturer’s permission, because letting the public learn how cars work could help malicious hackers, “third-party software developers” and competitors.

The EFF is compiling a petition for consumers and technicians, alike. Concerned consumers can find additional information on the original EFF article and the petition here: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/automakers-say-you-dont-really-own-your-car