By Richard Ward, Executive Director, American Vehicle Owners Alliance
When our legal frameworks protect consumers and leave room for innovation, America leads and the world benefits. That has been true across transportation and technology for decades. Clear rules give companies the confidence to invest and give consumers the confidence to adopt new services.
Vehicle data now tests whether that model still works.
Connected vehicles are central to how people and goods move. New transportation services will depend on real-time information generated by vehicles: location, diagnostics, battery health, maintenance needs, safety alerts, mileage, driving behavior, charging status, and performance data. Access to data is the lifeblood of those services.
But there’s a question over who actually owns that data: vehicle owners or manufacturers.
The transportation economy is moving beyond vehicle sales. All vehicles are becoming a source of continuous operational data. That data can help a repair shop diagnose a problem, help a fleet reduce downtime, help a parent monitor a teen driver, or help a company build a better service. Those opportunities shrink when vehicle data is locked inside manufacturer-controlled systems and withheld from vehicle owners.
Automakers have a powerful incentive to keep control. More control over vehicle data means more power for manufacturers. It lets them favor their own services, set the terms for competitors, and charge owners or third parties for access to information generated by vehicles the owners already paid for. That hurts all consumers, and it stifles the next generation of American transportation companies.
The status quo only lines the pockets of automakers while shutting out future competitors and ultimately harming the entire transportation industry. But Congress can fix that.
The Data Rights to Information and Vehicle Electronic Records (DRIVER) Act, introduced by Representatives Diana Harshbarger, Randy Weber, and Scott Perry, would rebalance the industry’s incentive structure by restoring data ownership to vehicle owners. This would ensure automakers would have to actually compete in the mobility economy. America wins when rules protect consumers and allow competition. That is how new services get built, smaller companies compete, and transportation innovation moves from an idea to something consumers can use.
The next transportation economy will be built on data. Congress should make sure vehicle owners control the data they generate, and innovators can compete to serve them.
That starts with the DRIVER Act.