
First came the Breathalyzer, now meet the roadside police “textalyzer” - tekacs
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/04/first-came-the-breathalyzer-now-meet-the-roadside-police-textalyzer/
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schismsubv
We have this odd fixation in the US (and perhaps elsewhere) that we believe we
are powerful and smart enough to prevent all badness - Make It Never Happen
Again. Never mind that smoking causes two orders of magnitude more deaths
annually in the US, 3400 people die from distracted* driving! It could be your
daughter next!

What's happened to critical thinking and moderate stances? Why can't people be
reasonable any more? To echo a sentiment I first read here (the provenance of
which I am unsure), "Our increased reliance on laws to regulate behavior is a
measure of how uncivilized we’ve become".

*- Distractions also include: pets, sandwiches, passengers, and beautiful people.

~~~
leetrout
Very very good point about the other distractions. I've read stories in the
news of people getting distracted driving tickets for eating a burger while
driving.

The only thing about your argument (and I come from this side as a
motorcyclist) is the odds of 2nd hand smoke killing me is pretty low. But the
danger in which you put everyone else around you is magnitudes higher by
distracted driving.

~~~
schismsubv
While I understand your concern, you are, statistically speaking (and
according to the CDC), still 12x more likely to die from secondhand smoke than
you are from another motorist's distracted driving.

The CDC states that smoking causes 480,000 deaths annually, 41,000 of which
are from secondhand smoke. Dying from someone hitting you while they swill a
triple mocha may sound scarier than dying from cancer, but dying is dying.

~~~
bryanlarsen
Why does the fact that smoking cause 480,000 deaths have any relation to
trying to prevent 3,400 needless deaths?

~~~
TheBranca18
It doesn't. Not sure of the official name but Appeal to Worse fallacies are
some of the worst I've come across. The smoking example is pretty much one of
the worst ones considering what we're talking about anyway. Smoking has gone
through a ton of regulation over the years. And is already rarer and rarer.

Perhaps scientists should stop finding a vaccine for Zika since it isn't as
bad as cancer and other deadly diseases.

I think the actual issue is trusting the American government with our privacy.
They've shown repeatedly that they don't care about it through various
initiatives.

~~~
talmand
The only time it makes sense to me is when the minor issue gets an
unreasonable amount of attention based on emotions rather than science to the
point that other issues that may actually be far more important are ignored.
Such as shifting limited resources from the major issue to the minor issue for
little gain.

Then there's the problem of the minor issue involving a law that can be used
for revenue generation.

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mariodiana
Part of what bothers me is this notion that "texting while driving impairs a
driver to the level of .08 blood alcohol level." (This quote comes from the
NYS Senate bill mentioned in the article.) If that's the case, can we expect
that the punishment for texting while driving will be similar to the
punishment for DUI? If not, why not?

If you ask me, this is just a lot of hysteria being put in the service of
revenue generation and more money for our government's corporate partners.

[https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2015/s6325/amendm...](https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2015/s6325/amendment/a)

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Guildpact
Seems like this would be hard to prove, often my girlfriend will be using my
phone while I am driving, how would this tell who was using it? I don't think
there is a way. This means if the driver was the sole person in the car you
could do this, otherwise it would be ambiguous.

~~~
Klathmon
or voice composition, i use software on my phone that came preinstalled to
tell it to send a text message to my wife without even looking at it (I've
actually used it on my motorcycle through my bluetooth helmet!)

~~~
leetrout
I do the same with Siri. Read & compose texts with both hands on the bars and
eyes on the road. I actually prefer it to trying to read something 10:1.

I have the iPhone 6+ in a ram mount just in front of the instrument cluster so
I could attempt to read it if the screen would consistently respond to my
gloved finger.

~~~
jlgaddis
I really should figure out how to do this.

My phone is typically either in the dedicated compartment in the "Infotainment
Center" or in the saddlebags. I almost always have my music playing (via
Bluetooth) but I can control that (skip songs, adjust volume, etc., via
controls on my hand grips). Because my phone is always paired via Bluetooth, I
do get the audible alert played through the stereo system when I receive an
SMS message -- and the ringtone and notification on my display when I receive
a phone call -- but I can't hear or read my messages through it.

After thinking about it for a moment, I don't think Siri would be able to
"hear" me, though, regardless of where my phone was (I don't have a Bluetooth
earpiece or anything like that and I don't wear a helmet). I'm gonna look into
it, though.

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dogma1138
Don't many cars with an "Infotainment Center" come today with a cabin
microphone so you could pair the phone to them as a headset?

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Klathmon
Yes, but many will not pass that mic back to the phone until you are on a
"phone call".

Why, i'm not sure, but it's infuriating whenever i get in my Mazda that voice
recognition won't work any more (the phone ignores it's mic because it's
connected to bluetooth that identifies as being able to handle that, and the
car won't send that info back to the phone).

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Olscore
Sets a bad precedent. Next they'll be analyzing receipts and purchases an hour
or two before to determine if you were at a bar, working too late (tired), or
whatever. Submit your health data as well, maybe your decision making was
impaired by poor diet and lack of exercise.

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s_q_b
They already analyze bar receipts.

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privong
> They already analyze bar receipts.

Do you have a source for this? It wouldn't surprise me, but it's the first
I've heard of it.

~~~
s_q_b
One example:

Bar Receipts are used to Indict Suspect in Fatal 2013 Hit-And-Run.

>> _Investigators interviewed witnesses and obtained bar receipts to determine
when, where and how much McIvor had been drinking, said Sgt. Tony Landato, a
Mesa police spokesman._

[http://www.azcentral.com/community/mesa/articles/20140206mes...](http://www.azcentral.com/community/mesa/articles/20140206mesa-
bar-receipts-used-indict-suspect-fatal-hit-run.html)

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tomtoise
Curious to know if it's even possible to know whether a driver has manually
sent a text message / composed it via voice / given it to the passenger to
compose text.

At least with breathalyzing, it's binary. You're either drunk or you're not,
there's no middle ground or room for interpretation.

~~~
corin_
Breathalyzing is binary but "being too drunk to drive safely" isn't, they just
made testing binary for the law's sake. It's possible to be under the limit
for a test yet still have enough alcohol in you to slightly impair your
driving if you're not used to drinking, it's also possible to be able to drink
quite a bit over the limit and still be sober enough to drive safely, but the
law just looks at averages and picks a spot to make it binary.

~~~
forgetsusername
> _they just made testing binary for the law 's sake_

In Canada, I think, penalties are doled out based on a few ranges of blood
alcohol content.

~~~
jdmichal
Laws are state specific in the US, but some do have levels below the
federally-mandated .08% with lesser penalties.

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cm3
With all the proactive wiretapping and data accumulation, why don't they just
ask the ISP/cell-provider for the data instead?

There's zero chance of me disputing that they messed with the phone and
created fake entries to bust me for causing an accident.

The cynic in me thinks these are benefits they would lose if excellent public
transport was available more readily than personal vehicle transportation.
Therefore, why would they be in favor of more people using public transport.

~~~
VLM
Its a good PR campaign that they're not monitoring all our communications,
therefore they need our cooperation to physically hand over the device, so
we'll think thats they only way to be monitored. Of course they are monitoring
the network, every byte.

~~~
cm3
The cooperation bit is funny, because if you have no choice by law, unless you
like to spend your time with judges and maybe in a cell, how is it
cooperation?

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jlgaddis
What happens if you simply don't have a phone with you?

I often leave my phone at home when going on short (say, 30 minutes, tops)
trips: to the grocery store, post office, bank, etc.

Statistically, I'm way more likely to be involved in a crash on one of these
short trips close to my home, I've heard. Let's say that I was. How would the
police know if I legitimately didn't have my phone with me or was refusing to
hand it over? Short of searching both my person and my vehicle (which now gets
us into other legal territory), they wouldn't know. Could I then face possible
repercussions for _NOT_ having my phone with me? (i.e. "He admitted to owning
a mobile phone but, when asked, refused to present it for inspection.")

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falcolas
I can only assume that for this software to work, you will have to unlock your
phone. Even if this software does only what it "promises" to do, what is
preventing a hypothetically corrupt officer to use one of their other tools
(such as the CelleBrite UFED) to dump the entire contents of the phone while
it's in their custody, or compromise it with a state sponsored virus?

Seems like too big a loophole, with no real benefits.

Could I store my smartphone in the trunk to avoid such a compelled search?
Probably not, as I think about it, since they could allege I put it there
after the accident took place.

~~~
jlgaddis
> _Could I store my smartphone in the trunk to avoid such a compelled search?
> Probably not, as I think about it, since they could allege I put it there
> after the accident took place._

I think their argument would be that even if the phone were in the trunk, you
could still have been using it via Bluetooth.

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runlevel1
In Riley v. California, the Supreme Court decided unanimously to limit the
ability of law enforcement to search cell phones while making arrests,
requiring police to obtain a search warrant before examining the data
contained in an arrestee’s device.

IANAL, but I presume this sidesteps that by:

1\. Pinky-swearing that they won't look at the individual's other data.

2\. Coercing consent to a search by threatening to take away their license.

3\. Performing the search before arresting so as not to get into "search
incident to arrest" (SITA) territory.

Seems dubious at best.

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Karunamon
So what would the evidentiary standard be in cases like this? As far as I
know, no mobile device out there differentiates between a text sent via hands
free vs one entered on the keyboard, so all this device could do is tell
whether a text was sent, not how, which makes it nigh useless since "I was
using handsfree" is unfalsifiable.

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gambiting
Why not a mandatory gastroscopy to see if the driver has recently eaten? In
many countries eating while driving is just as illegal as talking over the
phone. Surely we want to have the full image of what was happening before the
accident here?

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tehwebguy
Can't tell if the guys making and marketing this are human cancer or genius
capitalists.

~~~
corin_
I'd vote for your first option, personally.

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VLM
"the person's license or permit to drive and any non-resident operating
privilege shall be immediately suspended and subsequently revoked should the
driver refuse to acquiesce to such field test."

Wow. Driving without owning and carrying a smartphone means you lose your
license because you're refusing to give up a smartphone for search.

On the other hand I can get a burner bottom tier pay as you go Android for my
mom and MiL, toss it in her glove compartment, and tell her to give it to the
cop to keep her license if she gets in an accident. Both aren't interested in
smartphones and my MiL refuses to carry any sort of phone.

I've illegally driven without a smartphone a couple times when I've forgotten
it at home.

Interestingly the punishment for driving without carrying your license (wallet
left at home, etc) is lower, or used to be lower, than the proposed punishment
for driving without a smartphone.

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cm3
The optimist in me thinks autonomous vehicles will solve this and put the
burden on the web service and car if anything.

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jyunderwood
Why not request the data via a warrant?

~~~
schismsubv
They're treating it precisely like the breathalyzer. You can refuse either and
they will get a warrant for the search. In the meantime, your license and
freedom will be revoked, because US law says driving is a granted freedom, not
a right.

~~~
cmdrfred
> granted freedom

Feel that? It's Thomas Jefferson spinning in his grave.

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pjc50
A whole new form of intrusive search! With added presumption of guilt!

~~~
rocky1138
I love this cereal box sort of advertising. I often find myself adding "now in
tablet form!" to random things I read.

