this post was submitted on 07 Jul 2026
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cross-posted from: https://piefed.world/c/tech/p/1247209/all-cars-sold-in-the-eu-now-require-a-camera-aimed-at-your-face-its-still-not-clear-wher

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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[–] sunbeam60@feddit.uk 12 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

Im sorry, but this is just silly.

If a camera rocords your face, it can be used to identity you. Thus it falls under GDPR regulations as PII. That requires that the footage is kept no longer than needed for its purpose and that what happens to the data is spelled out exactly. My car already comes with a privacy policy that you can read.

So the answer is: Anything that can be used to identify you will deleted - or rather it will never get stored.

And the reason this regulation doesn’t spell out what happens to the data is that it doesn’t need to because GDPR covers ALL data already.

The EU is guilty of many things, but this is solely about increasing driver awareness and preventing deaths and injury - and it’s working, with each generation of requirements, less people die.

[–] abigscaryhobo@lemmy.world 4 points 6 hours ago

What sucks is you know the US is going to put it in their cars "to simplify production" and we dont have GDPR to protect us, so you know that data is going somewhere.

[–] Doom@lemmy.world 3 points 11 hours ago

You guys are hilarious with your "I'd just keep/buy an old car." The EU is also making it illegal to repair older vehicles and forcing people to replace "outdated" models with more environmentally friendly ones. China did the same thing with a buyback and destroy of all their outdated vehicles. Their aren't going to be any old vehicles. The only way to address this is to demand privacy rights and protection NOW.

[–] Marija_@programming.dev 7 points 15 hours ago

The data destination should be mandatory disclosure, not a mystery.

[–] dubyakay@lemmy.ca 4 points 15 hours ago
[–] nullspace@lemmy.world 18 points 1 day ago (1 children)

So if your teenager bangs their partner in the back seat do you sue your insurance or the automaker for recording child pornography?

[–] CeeBee_Eh@lemmy.world 5 points 9 hours ago

Depending on the locals laws, the very act of transmitting such images over the internet qualifies as "distribution of CSAM".

[–] SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world 32 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This is for cars where everything is being put on touchscreens so you have to take your eyes off of the road to control it?

[–] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (4 children)

A camera that faces both the driver and front windows by default, but only stores it where the owner wants it stored would be nice. Making it a default would change how cops interact with people.

[–] Rooster326@programming.dev 10 points 1 day ago (2 children)

If body cams being on didn't change how they interact with you. Nothing will.

The footage will only be used to harm you

[–] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago

The terrifying thing is, body cams probably did change how cops interact with people. They were that bad before. There's also been a few times when a cop their forgets to turn off their body cam or arrives late and got in some trouble.

If you actually owned the car and the software on the car, then you could set the feed to be stored offsite somewhere. Even if the cops knew it was being recorded, they wouldn't be able to get it deleted. Even if they deleted the local copy, they wouldn't be able to know how many backups there are.

[–] ScoffingLizard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

And make insurance higher, just like why tye scan IDs when you buy cigs and booze.

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[–] melsaskca@lemmy.ca 1 points 15 hours ago

The only option to avoid this is to agree to the "Crotch Cam" as a secondary feature, when purchasing. No salesman will visit your home. /s

[–] brownsugga@lemmy.world 10 points 1 day ago

Only buying pre 2018 cars from now on, I will have a Toyota collection that will run forever

[–] A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world 25 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

before long people are gonna want to buy nothing but used 70s and 80s carbuerated shitboxes just to avoid all this shit.

10 bucks says all this data is being fed back to insurance companies.

[–] nullspace@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

Please install this rootkit on your phone for $10 off your car insurance.

[–] m8052@lemmy.world 12 points 1 day ago (12 children)

What if you tape the camera ?

[–] tehn00bi@lemmy.world 2 points 7 hours ago

Just need a really tiny picture of your face to trick the camera.

[–] poopkins@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'm speculating wildly, but if the regulations for road sign cameras are anything to go by, the EU will require the car to wail at you every few seconds because it thinks the speed limit on the highway is 40 km/h because it picked up a sign on the offramp you just passed.

[–] CeeBee_Eh@lemmy.world 2 points 9 hours ago

I bet before long someone will have a design for a little device to place over the camera with an image that looks like the interior of a car with a random person's face visible. Doesn't even need to be a screen, just a backlit photo.

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[–] 1984@lemmy.today 16 points 1 day ago (2 children)

This was on the news today on tv and they showed a camera filming the driver, watching his upper body.

I bought a car from 2023 without all this shit so I'm very happy. Newer electric cars also beep when you go over the speed limit, which would drive me nuts.

[–] WereCat@lemmy.world 3 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago) (2 children)

My car shortly beeps 3x every time I go over speed limit. So I'm punished when I try to maintain speed limit and going 2kmph over triggers the beep. So I just constantly go 10kmph over now and I get those 3 beeps just for the first time I cross over the speed limit.

The beep is tied to the road sign monitoring setting so I have to turn off both, not just beeping. So then I don't get signs displayed on my dash board which can be actually useful sometimes.

[–] 1984@lemmy.today 5 points 10 hours ago

I think its horrible and should be illegal. It's a massive annoyance and could cause accidents since your attention is on that and not the traffic.

So tired of all the bullshit people never asked for.

[–] WildPalmTree@lemmy.world 1 points 11 hours ago (2 children)

May I suggest adaptive speed control.

[–] WereCat@lemmy.world 2 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago)

I use it a lot. I set it 10kmph above the speed limit as well. It's not perfect in a lot of city conditions and it can behave unexpectedly as well in these condition. Unless I want to fiddle with a spacing distance all the time and avoid sudden breaking for no reason I have to use it sparingly depending on time of day and location. Outside of cities it tends to work quite well for the most part. Some sharper bends trigger breaks too soon for no reason as well even though I've set sensitivity to the lowest.

Also during heavy rain it just tends to ignore everything in front of me and starts accelerating to the max set speed.

[–] 1984@lemmy.today 2 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago)

Don't you know how roads work? Different speeds, situations, city traffic? Any of this rings a bell?

[–] mastod0n@lemmy.world 9 points 1 day ago

If anyone owns a current BMW and the speed limit beeping drives them nuts:

Hold the "set" button on you steering wheel for about 2s, the screen will inform you the Warnung has been temporarily turned off (until your next start)

[–] ChaoticEntropy@feddit.uk 15 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Unless it can prove that it is running entirely locally with no outside connection, it can fuck off.

[–] Rooster326@programming.dev 6 points 1 day ago

Even then.... I still don't want it.

[–] Tryenjer@lemmy.world 34 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The primary purpose of AI systems is mass surveillance.

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[–] Senal@programming.dev 14 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

The mandate says nothing about cameras specifically.

I thought it did as well but it only specifies this :

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.

Don't get me wrong, manufacturers are going to have a fucking field day with all of the shit they'll try and get in under this banner of "safety" and they will almost certainly work their monetisation shenanigans in around this.

It might seem like that wording prohibits data collection, but it doesn't cover all the bases a team of well paid lawyers would be able to come up with. Or they could just do what they normally do and just ignore the "no data collection" part and pay the ~~cost of doing business tax~~ fine and rake in multiples of that fine in profits.

My point is , it doesn't specify cameras, so theoretically a company could come up with a non-face-scanning way of doing this and use that instead.

will they ?....fuck no...but they could if they wanted to.

Which is arguably worse.

edit : A note to say that I'm not arguing against the safety aspects of this , they might be fully valid, i'm arguing that it'll be abused for profit in any way the companies think will give them a positive ROI.

[–] BlackVenom@lemmy.world 2 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

My car has this... Hilariously the sleepy alert only kicks in when I decide to go slower than normal. The "keep hands on wheel" alert kicks off very frequently... Because roads are straight enough for no "input" to be detected

[–] Senal@programming.dev 2 points 14 hours ago

I've been in a car that lightly shook the steering wheel and pedals when you approached the speed limit.

That was super disconcerting because I didn't know it existed until my steering wheel started moving on it's own.

I'd rather have the option for a factory installed dashcam or at least a mount for me to install one.

[–] RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 33 points 1 day ago (12 children)

Sounds like more ways for insurance companies to a) charge you more based on behaviors they arbitrarily determine are “bad”, and b) take your payments for years/decades then never pay out because they say something you did on video makes any accident your fault based on some term buried in the 500 page contract you obviously didn’t read all of.

They already do “a” by taking vehicle blackbox info uploaded by dealers or via telemetry and increasing your rate via their risk analysis. Note, your rates never go down for good driving. Only up.

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