EU Mandates Driver-Facing Cameras in All New Cars

Starting July 7, 2026, every new car registered in the European Union must be equipped with an Advanced Driver Distraction Warning (ADDW) system — a driver-facing camera that monitors gaze and head position to detect distraction or drowsiness. While the regulation aims to reduce the estimated 10-30% of serious accidents linked to driver distraction, privacy experts are raising alarm about who ultimately controls the footage and whether enforcement is adequate.

How the System Works

ADDW uses an infrared camera mounted on the steering column, dashboard, or near the interior mirror to track the driver’s eye and head movements in real time, as VRT NWS reports. At speeds above 50 km/h, the system issues a warning — acoustic, visual, or haptic — after 3.5 seconds of looking away from the road. Between 20 and 50 km/h, the threshold extends to 6 seconds. Drivers can disable the system, but it reactivates automatically each time the vehicle is started.

The mandate is part of the EU’s broader General Safety Regulation 2 (GSR2), adopted in 2019, which also requires emergency stop signals, alcohol interlock preparation, and event data recorders (“black boxes”). According to Autonext, the regulation is part of the EU’s “Vision Zero” strategy to eliminate traffic fatalities by 2050.

Strict Rules — But Weak Enforcement?

EU regulations explicitly prohibit storing ADDW footage, transmitting it outside the vehicle, or selling it to third parties such as insurers or marketers. Facial recognition software is also banned. The data must be processed locally in real time.

Yet privacy experts across Belgium and the Netherlands question whether these rules will hold. Lieven Desmet, a privacy professor at KU Leuven, told VRT NWS: “Europe makes good rules to avoid that. But there’s too little oversight to know if those rules are being followed.”

Sofie Royer, a cybersecurity professor at VUB and KU Leuven, echoed the concern: “Privacy authorities are overburdened and understaffed. How many cars are on the road? It’s not allowed, but that doesn’t mean manufacturers wouldn’t dare.”

The Volkswagen Precedent

Experts point to a major data leak at Volkswagen in December 2024 as a cautionary tale. Researchers discovered that location data, driving behavior, and owner names of 800,000 electric vehicles were exposed online. For VW and SEAT vehicles, location accuracy was within 10 centimeters, allowing tracking of individuals for months. “With that data you could follow someone for 3 months,” Desmet said. “You could deduce where that person lives, works, and what their hobbies are.”

While the leak did not involve ADDW camera data, it demonstrated systemic vulnerabilities in automotive data security — and the gap between regulatory promises and real-world practice.

Function Creep: A Pattern of Expansion

Vincent Böhre, director of Dutch privacy organization Privacy First, warns that today’s strict rules may not last. “Current regulations seem well-organized,” he told EenVandaag. “Yet history teaches us time and again that such rules eventually get expanded. I fear these images will be stored and exchanged in the future.”

Böhre draws parallels to video doorbells — originally for home security, now routinely used by police for investigations — and CCTV cameras, once rare and now ubiquitous. “It fits within a broader trend where the government increasingly gets behind the driver’s wheel and watches everything,” he said. “Cars have essentially become a kind of rolling computers.”

Legal and Insurance Implications

A Belgian legal precedent from 2017 raises further questions. That year, a judge used data from a car’s onboard computer — not camera footage — as evidence in a fatal accident case. Royer asks what happens when a judge subpoenas ADDW data: “The rules say ADDW data can never be shared with others. But what about an investigating judge who requests the data in court?”

Insurers also have strong incentives to access driver attention data. Böhre warns: “In various studies, major insurers indicate they have great interest in these systems. They could use this to determine whether someone should pay a higher or lower premium.”

Calibration and Driver Experience

The real-world effectiveness of ADDW depends heavily on manufacturer calibration. Early tests, such as those conducted by Gocar.be on the Xpeng P7+, found the system could be overly sensitive — warning when drivers check mirrors, glance at scenery, or turn to check blind spots. This creates frustration and may lead drivers to disable the system or engage in dangerous “fiddling” while driving.

As AutoWeek notes, the experience varies significantly between manufacturers. Some systems only warn during serious distraction, while others trigger alerts for routine glances at the navigation screen or over the shoulder — the latter being a safety-critical maneuver that the system incorrectly interprets as distraction.

What’s Next

As ADDW-equipped vehicles enter the market, several open questions remain: Who audits manufacturer compliance? Can courts override the “data stays in the car” rule? Will insurers find ways to access driver attention data? And as these vehicles enter the second-hand market, will privacy protections survive multiple ownership cycles?

The regulation takes effect July 7, 2026, for all newly registered vehicles in the EU. For now, the safety benefits are clear — but the privacy safeguards remain untested at scale.