B.C.'s distracted drivers to get hit with higher insurance premiums | Page 2 | GTAMotorcycle.com

B.C.'s distracted drivers to get hit with higher insurance premiums

my cell phone does much of what was described above. I have an Apple iPhone 7plus and a 2016 Civic EX with carplay.

A new thing recently with the phone is it is disabled when car / bike is moving. Anyone calling or texting will get an auto reply saying i am driving
and will get back to them when able. Prior to that i could answer hands free. Even have a text read to me by the car and also was able to reply to text
by voice and send it. Pretty cool.

Well, like I said I'm not a smartphone techie and sounds like devices already have some of the lockout capability I described. Above sounds great and if new phones have this then we should see a gradual decline in distracted driving accidents as old phones are replaced with new ones.

While fatalities per miles driven have been declining for years as cars get safer eliminating a huge percentage of accidents resulting in property damage, injury or death is still important. Also, I think the distracted driving/accident numbers are understated. What driver is going to freely admit they were using a cellphone when they plowed into something or someone.

In terms of post accident proof of cellphone use change laws to stipulated that any accident with property damage > $1,000 ( or pick a better number ) or any injury means automatic surrender of driver cellphone and securing cellphone activity from provider and then hit driver with fines and increased insurance cost. While there are still lots of HTA 172 charges placed every year the financial consequences of getting charged likely impacts and slows down a significant number of riders/drivers and increased enforcement and consequences could have a similar impact on cellphone users.
 
The accelerometer and other hardware sensors in the phone could be queried periodically by the phone's OS to determine the state of the device (i.e. velocity, keyboard usage, etc.) and that information recorded in a region of the phone which was immune from erasure. This would be similar to the function of a black box in an aeroplane. In the event of an accident, the authorities could get court permission to access this information through a search warrant issued to the teleprovider. The teleprovider could pull the information from the phone (in the same fashion they can push updates to the OS) and combine it with call records to determine whether the phone was in use at the time of the accident. The owner of the phone could not alter or destroy evidence, except if the phone was rooted.
 
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Not sure there's much problem with hands-free phone calls and don't see much impact on business. I could be wrong.

But if you're holding, dialing or texting your phone while you're driving you're a danger to everyone around you. Businesses adapted to all sorts of "social engineering" over the last decades. They can adjust to this one too, if need be.

I disagree. While I don't see a problem with a quick call to change an appointment long involved calls take the driver's attention away from the road.

If a driver gets lured into a long description of how to do something part of his mind is visualizing something other than the road ahead. That may explain drivers cutting across several lanes of traffic to get their exits.

Texting is a problem with present phones in that unless the text is sent records of the driver typing can be erased. The anti texting law makes it worse because the phone has to be hidden instead of being up where there is a possibility of the driver noticing things on the road. It's amazing how drivers at traffic lights become fascinated with their crotches.
 
...It's amazing how drivers at traffic lights become fascinated with their crotches.
Doesn't work if you're driving along HWY 7. York Regional Police ride the VIVA buses, gives them a good vantage point for people carrying phones on their lap. They radio to other police cars who hand out the tickets.
 

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