A Fight Over the Right to Repair Cars Takes a Wild Turn

THE COMMONWEALTH OF Massachusetts has become the unlikely vanguard of the movement to give car owners the right to repair their own vehicles. Now the US federal government is threatening to get in the way.

This week, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the US vehicle safety regulator, warned automakers not to comply with nearly three-year-old state law that requires them to share vehicle data with owners and independent auto repair shops. In a letter, a lawyer for the government argued that giving customers and repairers access to the vehicle systems demanded by Massachusetts could also make them available to hackers, who could then access steering, acceleration, braking, or electronics systems.

The conflict dates to 2020, when Massachusetts voters overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure granting them the right to repair their cars. The Alliance for Automotive Innovation, a trade association representing global auto manufacturers, filed a suit to prevent the law from going into effect. It argued that the law was preempted by federal vehicle safety rules—in other words, not the sort of thing Massachusetts voters could decide—and created safety risks by opening up its vehicles to manipulation. The federal judge overseeing the lawsuit has yet to decide on the case, and the federal government had stayed mum on it until this month.