La migra now has a camera in your car

The EU is mandating that every new car sold gets a driver-monitoring camera — it watches for blinking, head turns, phone use, even yawning. If the system detects inattention, it can cut power to the engine. The rule takes effect next month for new models and by 2026 for all new sales. It's the biggest push yet for a system that was originally designed for the US, where the NHTSA has been pushing for it since 2019.

The cameras use the same cheap sensors already inside phones and laptops — infrared LEDs paired with a tiny camera. The software tracks your eyes, your head, sometimes your mouth. In the EU, the data must stay on the car. In the US, Tesla has been streaming this kind of sensor data to the cloud for years, and the NHTSA is asking manufacturers to report on it. The difference is whether the government can see what your car is watching you do.

Why this matters for us: if the US goes the EU route but keeps the data in the cloud, every car becomes another way la migra or the feds can track where we drive and how we drive it.