New York eyes a 'breathlyzer' for texting while driving

This will be struck down by the courts so fast the ink won't even be dry. Your phone is the backbone of your life and contains pretty much all of your private information and allowing police to scoop all of that up without a warrant is blatantly unconstitutional.

Anyone know where I can get one of these devices that can bypass the security of a smartphone and scrape it's contents? Also, will the mobile OS manufacturers be patching this gaping security hole?

These technologies (including actual breathlyzer) are patches that might reduce bad human driving behavior but will never eliminate it. In my opinion the only way to solve this is to stop humans from driving altogether. The biggest reason I'm excited that self driving car technology is maturing is because I won't need to worry (and often see through windshield) that a fellow driver is pressing gas pedal while paying no attention where he/she 's going.

The article mentions this technology is still glitchy. But how will it ever become non-glitchy? Police will not be able to constitutionally require you to provide a passcode if the phone is locked and there is established case law to support this, so the device would have to scan the phone without a passcode.<p>Doesn&#x27;t existing security on modern phones (the iPhone&#x27;s secure enclave, for example) make this extremely difficult to do?

Is it keeping track of speed while I perform tasks? or the text I sent a few minutes ago in a parking lot with the car off going to get me a ticket?<p>Or, what if I handed my phone to the passenger?

This article was really light on technological details:<p>&gt;The technology is still in development. But the concept is a device that would use cutting-edge software to determine whether a person&#x27;s smartphone was being used at the time of an accident.<p>Does anyone know anything about what Cellebrite does? Their website feels jargon-y on the surface, didn&#x27;t get a clear sense of what all they do on an initial visit. Is what they&#x27;re proposing even possible without help from Apple&#x2F;Google?

It seems like there are a couple big issues with this.<p>1) What if your passenger was using your phone?<p>2) What if you using voice-commands to send a text (especially if via CarPlay, etc...)?

I just don&#x27;t know how this could be provable? Either there&#x27;s an OS level log that you&#x27;re signing your life away on that is a huge privacy risk (and requires OS level engineering) or they&#x27;re just guesstimating off data use. I can&#x27;t see how they&#x27;d be able to differentiate from a hands free UX interaction from one done physically. Also, if in a car of multiple people, it begs the question who is responsible for using the phone? When traveling with friends&#x2F;family&#x2F;significant others&#x2F;guests often we hand off our device for media usage.

This is a horrible idea.<p>I&#x27;m not going to unlock my phone for the cops just because they pull me over. Once they connect, who knows what data they will capture and how that will be used. Driving isn&#x27;t probable case for them to look through my emails... and once I unlock my phone for them they can see everything.<p>Also... it&#x27;s stupidly easy to circumvent. Just carry an old phone and switch it out when they ask. They won&#x27;t have probable cause to search the car, so it&#x27;s really whatever phone you give them.<p>I hate how they waste tax money on crap like this.

How soon before Apple and Google patch whatever mechanisms this tool is using to check phone activity?<p>Since my phone uses Qi charging, maybe I see a value in epoxying my USB port...

Constitutions normally only protect the content of communications, not the fact that communications occur. This isnt even the traditional metadata debate (inside v outside of an envalope). They dont care who or what you text, just the when and that you did. A mandatory tech that betrays only the time that a text was sent will probably survive legal scrutiny.

“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety” - Ben Franklin

So um, can we name and shame whatever start-up is doing this?

Pointless. I mean sure if they see them do it, fine them, but I am far more concerned with drivers who are drunk - they are dangerous the entire trip.

this is why we just need to get self-driving cars sooner, this is solving the wrong problem.

this seems to be unconstitutional on its face, but the courts have been willing to let cops get away with murder, so it probably would end up being allowed.

This is the beginning of the end. Privacy is gone, humanity is doomed. What other data will these devices skim while they are looking through the phone OS to see when the last text message you sent was?<p>We are on a slippery slope to being completely controlled by cops and their technology. Pretty soon every law enforcement vehicle is going to come equipped with a LTE spoofer running in their car that skims all this information from the phones in the near vicinity.<p>You&#x27;ll get automatic messages in your car&#x27;s dashboard display when you send a text message - &quot;Pull over, you broke the law and sent a text while driving. A cop will be here soon to arrest you.&quot;