California Law Addresses Vehicle Tracking and Privacy

A recent California law aims to protect domestic violence survivors by requiring automakers to provide a way to disable location access from inside the vehicle. The law is not expected to halt new car sales. Automakers have already implemented core protections, such as terminating access to connected vehicle services for survivors.

However, the industry faces a complex engineering challenge in retrofitting existing vehicles with the new location-disabling feature, due to differences in hardware, software, and connected-service architectures. The law highlights ongoing concerns about the collection of location and vehicle data, and the need for improved privacy controls.

According to the law, automakers must provide a solution to disable location tracking in vehicles. Lawmakers, regulators, and automakers are expected to work together to find a solution, which may involve updates to existing vehicles or changes to future models.