Automobiles and the DMCA

By SemiWiki

November 10, 2015

When you drive a car off the dealer’s lot, you own the whole vehicle, right? For decades, car owners have popped the hood and crawled under the car to do their own maintenance; and for those mechanically inclined, even make modifications to improve performance or handling. However, in an era where a car is increasingly controlled by software, the right to tinker with your vehicle has been called into question. After all, software is often sold under a license and the end user doesn’t actually own the code. This means there is a lot of uncertainty about to what extent the public can modify the software embedded in a car.

Today the Library of Congress brought a bit more clarity to the situation by granting exemptions from the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) that would enable the public to delve into the embedded systems and software in their vehicles for “good faith security research” and “lawful modification.” This was a much anticipated decision that captured the attention of everyone from the auto industry to the cybersecurity research community.

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