- DEKRA CEO: Legislation should go beyond business-to-business use cases
- ROADPOL, EVU and DEKRA join forces to call for sector-specific regulation
- Data Act proposal appreciated for setting up basic principles
āThe sector-specific legislation cannot only pertain to business-to-business use casesā, says DEKRA CEO Stefan Kƶlbl. āSovereign use cases absolutely need to be included. Access to the relevant in-vehicle data is essential if police and prosecutors as well as vehicle inspection organizations and accident analysis experts are to do their important job in the future, with vehicles becoming more and more automated and connected. This is very much in the consumersā interest.ā
āEuropean traffic police forces have ā beyond their main task of traffic enforcement ā the important task of investigating road accidents. More and more automated vehicles on European roads have a big impact on this taskā, says ROADPOL president Volker Orben. āAutomated vehicles have no drivers who can be questioned how the accident happened. Therefore, police need access to reliable vehicle data in order to secure forensic evidence, possibly with support from external experts. Investigations have the aim to reconstruct how the accident happened ā which is a precondition to decide who caused it.ā
āFor the purpose of accident research, but also for determining the causes of crashes, data generated in vehicles must be stored in neutral trust centers and be accessible for the legitimate stakeholders ā without limitations by manufacturers or system providersā, points out EVU president Jƶrg Ahlgrimm. āFor example, it will not be long until we must be able to determine whether, at a specific point of time, the vehicle was controlled by the user or by an automated system. Authorities need to have easy and quick access to the relevant data in such cases. When it comes to possible malfunctions of automated systems as a cause for accidents, storing the data in a neutral place will be especially significant.ā
The same goes for vehicle inspection. DEKRA is the global number one in the field, carrying out roughly 27 million inspections in 23 countries around the world. āThe role of periodical-technical inspection is to make sure that vehicles are safe, secure and comply with environmental regulations throughout their lifecycle. This also needs to cover functions potentially changed through a software updateā, stresses DEKRA CEO Kƶlbl. āTo verify the correct functionality of vehicle systems which depend on software, such as advanced driver assistant systems and automated driving systems, independent and trusted access to unmodified and non-prefiltered data is vital.ā
At the same time, ROADPOL, EVU and DEKRA experts are convinced that the consumer using a connected product, e.g. a vehicle, must be made aware of who has access to data generated by the product and that any transmission of data can only happen with the userās consent, unless the data transmission pertains to sovereign tasks. This is called the user-centric approach. Manufacturers should not have the monopoly over the data.
āFor future mobility to be safe, legislators need to make sure that a clear framework for regulated data access is set up in a well-thought-out way and that such access is provided under the so-called āFRANDā principles, which means fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory accessā, says DEKRA CEO Stefan Kƶlbl.