Massachusetts Senate Passes Resolution To Do In-Depth Study On Right-To-Repair (vice.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: On July 25, the Massachusetts Senate approved a Resolution that would create a special commission that would research the feasibility of forcing device manufacturers to treat customers and independent repair shops the same as officially licensed repair outlets. According to the proposed study, that means providing customers and independent repair shops with "repair technical updates, diagnostic software, service access passwords, updates and corrections to firmware, and related documentation." Gay Gordon Byrne, executive director of The Repair Organization, helped push the bill in 2012 and has been working to extend the law to tech companies ever since. "This is just one step in a series of steps that will end Repair Monopolies for technology products. I'm thrilled," Byrne told me in an email about the pending study.

The Resolution to create the study group still needs to pass the Massachusetts House, but the session ends July 31 so right-to-repair watch dogs won't have to wait long to see if it goes forward. The proposed makeup of the study commission shows that the legislature is serious about the issue and also reveals how big tech's repair monopoly is about much more than just being able to open up your iPhone without voiding the warranty. The legislature wants the study commission to include 23 members, including various members of the legislature but also a wealth of experts in various tech fields. They want someone from the Massachusetts Farm Bureau, a medical device manufacturer, an expert on electronic waste recycling, someone who repairs complex medical equipment, an intellectual property lawyer, a cyber security expert, a local farmer, and various other experts and citizens affected or knowledgeable about the right-to-repair.

Comments

Right to repair?

[DontBeAMoran]

Tell me, Mr. Anderson... what good is a right to repair... if your devices are glued shut?

Re:Right to repair?

[viperidaenz]

Next will be heat resistant glue and ultrasonic welding

Re:Right to repair?

[Anonymous Coward]

glued shut *and* no replacement parts available other than chinese knockoffs that are never quite right.

a 'right to repair' law needs to go 'bigger'. not only should you have the right to repair your own stuff, but manufacturers need to make stuff that *can* be repaired, can be taken apart. can be put back together... AND have actual factory original or equivalent parts available.

ya know: design and build stuff to last, not just to last-until-the-warranty-expires. REDUCE is the first step of reduce-reuse-recycle. companies have forgotten that first, and very significant bit in the chase for bigger profits. replacing your phone every year isn't helping. having a phone that lasts 5+ years, than another 3 as someone else's refurbished used phone, would.

Re:Right to repair?

[Anonymous Coward]

glued shut *and* no replacement parts available other than chinese knockoffs that are never quite right.

a 'right to repair' law needs to go 'bigger'. not only should you have the right to repair your own stuff, but manufacturers need to make stuff that *can* be repaired, can be taken apart. can be put back together...

Government should largely stay out of the free market, save where staying out clearly makes things worse.

There are four areas that come to mind:

1. Areas that will cost the average consumer significantly more money in the long term without government interference. For instance, if a house was built without any codes at all, and it requires 50k work the day after you move in, well that is bad. Building codes are a reasonable interference by government. Now you could argue how far they need to go. That is a separate issue..

2. Areas that will cost the average consumer quality of life or health. For instance pollution has real costs to quality of life and health.

3. As a way to encourage minimal labour standards. If a country has slave labour, well you don't buy from them at all. If a company has a sixty hour work week, maybe that justifies a tariff.

4. National defence. We should be able to build needed defence items with goods and services available from resources that are likely to be available in reasonable future scenarios. Basically if you have a significant chance of a conflict with a country, you have to make sure that conflict won't cut you off from materials you need. That doesn't mean everything has to be made in America. It just means you need a plan.

The right to repair thing would fit in with 1,2, and possibly 4, but the presumption is on non interference. If that group can make a solid case for why interference will benefit the consumer, then it is fair game, though you'd have to revisit it once you got some solid data in.

For instance, it may be fine if something is non repairable if it is cheap enough, and recyclable.... It may even be fine if it is costing the consumer twice as much, provided that the devices are continuing to improve. Now if nothing is improving and your still paying twice as much that is arguable a legitimate place for government interference, but again the presumption is it is usually better not to interfere.

Re:Right to repair?

[another_twilight]

You list 4. but how is a military normally a 'free market' item? If you include it, what about other things like infrastructure and utilities? Surely they are better handled by some form of co-operative or government?

What about regulation of shared resources to avoid tragedy of the commons (so indirect involvement in markets via environmental protection for eg)?
And here I'm not just talking about things that cause direct health impact, but indirect problems like overgrazing common fields or destroying parkland.

If the latter, then why not legislation that seeks to limit the waste inherent in manufacture of unrepairable products.

The idealised free market doesn't work well for long term costs. We have cognitive biases that discount long term costs vs short term gains. This is an area where an individual, with multiple pressures for limited expenditure may choose a cheaper, non-repairable product because the cost to them is only going to be realised over a term that makes it hard to properly assess on a personal level, but which is distinct at a social or governmental level.

Re:Right to repair?

[giggleloop]

"since government tends to add indirect costs, so the benefits need to exceed those indirect costs..." You mean like paying its employees a decent wage, implementing proper safety protocols and not cutting corners?

Re:Right to repair?

[Registered Coward v2]

You list 4. but how is a military normally a 'free market' item? If you include it, what about other things like infrastructure and utilities? Surely they are better handled by some form of co-operative or government?

Interestingly in the US when electric utilities first started they were not monopolies. The strung their own wires, resulting in multiple sets serving the same area. The utilities pushed for regulation since they couldn't make a lot of money when you had multiple providers competing for the same customers. In exchange for a monopoly they limited their service area and could not sell across the boundaries except to the other utilities to handle excess demand.

Phone companies competed early on as well, resulting in challenges to connect to people on competing services.

Of course, competition also meant that sparsely populated areas didn't get service since it was unprofitable, resulting in the government passing laws to drive rural electrification.

Re:Right to repair?

[Dragonslicer]

You list 4. but how is a military normally a 'free market' item? If you include it, what about other things like infrastructure and utilities? Surely they are better handled by some form of co-operative or government?

In the United States, basic infrastructure was included as part of the role of the federal government. In a time before the Internet, telephones, and electricity, communication consisted entirely of written letters. That was pretty much the only basic infrastructure that existed in the late 18th century (water supply and sewers were starting to show up, but they were still highly localized systems), so the Constitution includes post offices and roads as part of the federal government.

When asked why the federal government should be able to regulate the Internet, my response is that the Internet is simply the modern form of the postal system.

Re: Right to repair?

[cyber-vandal]

Where can the consumer buy an easily repairable smartphone that runs an operating system with a large variety of applications?

Re:Right to repair?

[Immerman]

One thing to consider with "right to repair" movements, is that they usually don't address "non-repairable" items - things where manufacturing decisions make repair difficult or impossible, though that's certainly worth addressing, especially in the long term.

Usually the primary target is "dealer-only repair" - cars, farm equipment, appliances, etc., where they *are* designed to be repaired, but access to the necessary parts and tools is restricted to those who have preferential relationships with the manufacturer. This has gotten especially bad lately as many manufacturers have taken lessons from printer-ink sales tactics, where gratuitous electronics and copy-protection schemes are added for the express purpose of locking out off-brand replacements, and even servicing.

When you get into manufacturing repairability decisions, there's another thing that might be worth considering as well - right-to-recycle. China has stopped accepting the world's plastic waste in part because we've made it too difficult to recycle by doing things like bonding multiple layers of incompatible materials together - e.g. plastic, paper, and/or foil laminates, making it effectively impossible to recycle even remotely cost-effectively. (Another part is that we've gotten really bad about sorting our recyclable trash, with similar results, but that's a different topic altogether)

Re:Right to repair?

[desdinova 216]

but we can't make them repairable and THINNER

Re:Right to repair?

[desdinova 216]

like the Yogi said "It's deja vu all over again"

Re:Right to repair?

[Darinbob]

Non-repairable products can cause harm, thus a government has a vested interest in paying attention. Non-repairable means you have to buy new products, and increased economic burden. If a consumer has purchased a product, then that product belongs to the consumer and all rights by the manufacturer have ceased in this regard; preventing the consumer from repairing is an attempt by the manufacturer to continue owning the product. Being unable to replace batteries, the most commonly needed repairs, causes unnecessary waste and disposal of hazardous materials. Being made the way they are it is nearly impossible to recycle or separate the batteries from many of these products which will inevitably end up in landfill. Recycling is generally not done because it costs too much to do so effectively, and the problem is often exported to third world countries.

There are some cases where owner repair should be prohibited, such as in the cases of safety. However independent repair shops should be allowed the right to do the repairs.

Re:Right to repair?

[Darinbob]

A free market has been proven through history to not function without regulation. A free market cannot exist without it also being a fair market, and companies have rarely offered the "fair" part voluntarily. The goal of corporations is to maximize profits by any means necessary that they can get away with, and laws step in to make sure that they can't get get away anything.

When left to their own devices we have seen in the past the common sale of unsafe and dangerous products including products that have caused injury and death, products that did not perform as described, rampant pollution, child labor, mistreatment of workers, bullying of smaller market players, etc.

How the car industry does it?

[snikulin]

I honestly don't know. If I establish my own repair shop for Teslas, can I freely buy all the required HW and SW from Tesla Inc?

Thanks!

Re:How the car industry does it?

[Anonymous Coward]

A: You can diagnose and repair any car but Tesla because of overpriced proprietary features.
B: A is a moron you can't diagnose and repair a Tesla because of overpriced proprietary features.

See the problem?

Better include cars

[Anonymous Coward]

Most modern cars store their configuration in encrypted CCF files - usually over the CANbus network in the engine management unit - and you have to buy a decryption key for hundreds (or even thousands) of dollars if you want to change anything.

e.g.: Want to replace the pathetic factory fitted halogen headlamps with HID or even laser-phosphorous headlamps? The new ones won't even turn on until you update the encrypted CCF to tell it what type of headlamp they are.

Re:Better include cars

[Anonymous Coward]

"Most modern cars store their configuration in encrypted CCF files - usually over the CANbus network in the engine management unit - and you have to buy a decryption key for hundreds (or even thousands) of dollars if you want to change anything."

by encryption you mean hexadecimal? or do you mean the mapping as to which byte refers to which setting? Ive been able to pull the configuration hex files from most european cars since 2000 the trick is finding an accurate mapping of the variables when you dont have the diagnostic tools which do it automatically and make it look pretty with icons and check boxes.

Cars already are repairable by the consumer and all of the software required to do so is available to purchase. This is not like john deere which will not sell any of their diagnostic equipment at all and forces farmers to go to their dealers for service thus creating a monopoly situation where john deere can charge whatever they want. The other side of the argument when it comes to cars is that the cost of the diagnostic equipment is there to make sure that the average person with little to no knowledge about cars and the electronics inside of them don't go poking around and changing settings that could potentially damage the vehicle. You have to realise that alot of these diagnostic systems are there for trained professionals who understand all of the functions of the vehicle as well as carry insurance in the case of mistakes that cause serious problems with the vehicle. So while you are complaining about the COST of being able to repair your vehicle you are still able to repair it or change anything you want, the manufacturers just make it hard enough that the average person doesnt go screwing around in there just because they can. This is not a bad thing in any shape, it protects consumers from themselves as well as potentially creates small businesses, after all if headlight replacement is a common enough problem then it is an easy business write-off to purchase all of the tools/equipment that you need which is much different than cellphones or other modern day electronics where manufacturers sell neither the manuals nor the tools. The right to repair is not about the consumers individual ability to repair their stuff but their ability to be able to go to an independent repair shop thus creating competition in the market for repairs, it also is to stop manufactures from monopolistic behavior like bricking devices that were repaired at an independent shop.

TLDR: you can already repair your own vehicle as parts are readily available as well as manuals. Giving access to the electronics to everyone would cause more problems than it would solve. They make the barrier just high enough that anyone who is going to cross it has a good idea of what they are doing.

Re:Better include cars

[drinkypoo]

TLDR: you can already repair your own vehicle as parts are readily available as well as manuals. Giving access to the electronics to everyone would cause more problems than it would solve.

There is still room for improvement here. Changing settings in various computers requires secrets; to get into modules far enough to change interesting settings you typically need a dealer ID and a password. Or, someone has to dump the rom, disassemble it, etc. Nobody should have to go that far to make some legal changes to their vehicle.

Re:Better include cars

[Dragonslicer]

This study doesn't have to include cars. Right to Repair for cars was already passed in Massachusetts about 5 years ago. The purpose of the study is to determine if that law should be extended to other products.

Nonsense.

[Synonymous Homonym]

It is never illegal to repair anything you own. You may void the warranty by doing so, but that's not illegal.

Re:Nonsense.

[drinkypoo]

For any other car, I can legally buy OEM, remanufactured or third party parts.

There's lots of cases where that's not true, and there are parts that they won't sell you. Automakers discontinue parts before the suppliers are allowed to sell them directly on occasion, and before remans are generally available. Automakers have agreements with suppliers as to when they are allowed to sell the same parts to someone else. Sometimes there is little enough demand that everyone discontinues a part, and it's not particularly repairable, and then you have to wait for someone else to make a workalike.

For a shit Tesla itâ(TM)s illegal to buy any replacement parts.

Who told you that?

Re:Nonsense.

[Cajun Hell]

It is never illegal to repair anything you own.

Wow. You are literally 20 years out of date .

Hey everyone, this guy hasn't even lived through Y2K yet!

20 years. Oh boy, are you going to be in for a wild ride as you catch up. Remember that scene in Back to the Future when the kid tells the doc who the president is in 1985? Well, wen I hit you with the 2018 news, you're going to call me a liar, and I'll just be smugly smiling, temporarily forgetting my troubles because I got to meet a time traveler.

Re:Nonsense.

[Synonymous Homonym]

Because physical repairs fall under the purview of copyright.

You seem to have no idea how law works.

You ban those

[rsilvergun]

the study's the first step to that. They'll run numbers showing the cost to the taxpayer of devices that crap out on the user after a year or two and that can't be repaired by design. Once there's hard numbers it'll be harder for the companies to hide behind ambiguity like they do today.

Re:You ban those

[mysidia]

the study's the first step to that. They'll run numbers showing the cost to the taxpayer of devices that crap out on the user after a year or two and that can't be repaired by design

Excellent.... the more studies on this subject, the better... We need the public and legislators to more clearly see a mounting pile of evidence; especially discussing the history of new manufacturer "security" measures and anti-analysis tricks (Consumable/limited-life components and storage media soldered on, replacement part supply channel restrictions -- misuse of IPR rights to disrupt the purchase of aftermarket repair components, excessive secrecy, self-bricking devices.... Chips that erase themselves if you attempt to read, etc.) that seem designed to impede legitimate knowledge, access, and ability repair modify or reprogram.

Re:What's there to study?

[another_twilight]

What did you buy?

Just the item, or should there exist an obligation by the manufacturer to provide information to assist others in repairing the device they sold? Like specifications, data sheets, codes etc.

This kind of circles back to some of the original reasons for encouraging patents - so that inventions didn't remain a mystery when the inventor died, but that their ideas could go on to be developed. In exchange, they are granted a limited period to monopolise that invention or idea and are protected by law.

This attempt to balance the obligations and rights of a manufacturer so that they and the market they wish to sell to both benefit is what this sort of thing is about.

Hardware based monopolies need to go also

[wierd_w]

Take for instance, hardware that is more than capable of running other things (take a nintendo switch for instance. Without the locked boot loader, it can run Linux just like any other tegra based system. Works great doing it too.) that is crippled by its retailer/OEM to only run a single ecosystem, designed to be locked down hard, where there is no viable alternative market space for software.

I am picking on Nintendo here, because of how they chose to combine hardware IDs with user IDs for their services. (Each console has a unique console certificate that is used to encrypt the eMMC module, preventing you from simply replacing it, even though it is modular-- for starters. This certificate is also used to ban the console if it is modified in any way nintendo does not like, even if those modifications are redacted/expunged.)

suppose for a moment that you purchase a second hand switch from say-- ebay, or a used item from Amazon. The console works perfectly fine, but has a banned certificate. (Or, it does not work properly, and has a bad eMMC module, which again, is modular.) You might have the right to repair the console, but you do not have access to the digital keys needed to replace or restore the eMMC's contents to factory defaults, and you do not have a means of compelling Nintendo to unban the console if they did so after doing the restoration.

These kinds of things are direct consequences of hardware based distribution control mechanisms, and are wholly incompatible with right to repair, and first sale doctrine type protections.

If the US government is going to start championing for consumer rights in the forms of right to repair type regulations, they are going to have to put a foot down on hardware based DRM mechanisms, which imply a fixed ecosystem for that hardware, and a sole point-of-authority on legitimate repair and return to service.

That means:

No locked boot loaders
No hardware unique certificates or identifiers
No hardware encrypted storage (software encrypted is fine)

Good luck getting companies like console makers to abide by those. They will tell you all about how those restrictions are absolutely required for their industry, and the like.

In short, the government has to either decide to shit or get off the pot on that. There is no compromise. Either those things are made illegal, and right to repair rules-- or right to repair dies, and locked hardware stays a thing.

Re:Hardware based monopolies need to go also

[wierd_w]

I should probably clarify--

Hardware unique identifiers that are used as a supply chain or service identification lockout.

A simple identity tag is not what is intended. A tag that gets automatically interrogated by a fixed and central authority for the purposes of denial of service/blacklisting-- that is what I mean.

A VIN number is fine, as long as the VIN number is not part of a centrally enforced denial of service/tamper detection system.

Re:Hardware based monopolies need to go also

[Registered Coward v2]

Take for instance, hardware that is more than capable of running other things (take a nintendo switch for instance. Without the locked boot loader, it can run Linux just like any other tegra based system. Works great doing it too.) that is crippled by its retailer/OEM to only run a single ecosystem, designed to be locked down hard, where there is no viable alternative market space for software.

The solution is simple; don't buy a Nintendo console if they won't do what you want. Buy one that does. I do not like DRM either and avoid whenever possible buying stuff that has it. As for single ecosystems, it's again a choice to be made - lock in or go elsewhere?

first sale doctrine type protections.

First sale does not mean that whatever you sell still has all the features available to the original buyer, unless the manufacturer specifically states so such as a transferable warranty, etc. Even the doctrine of first sale is not absolute, but varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.

In many ways the right to repair, especially for consumer electronics, is a chimera. Sure, manufacturers many be forced to make available parts, manuals, software diagnostics, etc. but the costs may be so high that it is not economical for a third party shop to buy them because the may never recoup the costs, and /or the cost to fix after you buy parts and add in some labor is so high that consumers simply chose to forgo repairs and buy a new device. Individuals would still be locked out because the costs of manuals etc. would probably be much more than simply buying a new device. If the market is big enough their will be third party tools sold, such as is done with automotive diagnostic software. A small subset would get bootleg copies of the manufacturers software to mod their stuff, such as is done with BMW's diagnostic and coding software.

Re:Hardware based monopolies need to go also

[drinkypoo]

A VIN number is fine, as long as the VIN number is not part of a centrally enforced denial of service/tamper detection system.

But it is. It's just not remotely enforced. If the government notices that your VIN doesn't match then they can get quite upset. There is a procedure for re-VIN, if you are swapping parts around. For example, dropping a body from one truck (which is where the VIN is recorded) onto another truck's chassis (which is where the emissions equipment is located — the powertrain is considered a chassis component, not a body component, for relatively obvious reasons.*) If you don't follow the legal procedure, then you can be punished harshly, including loss of vehicle.

* Unit bodies are another issue but let's keep it simple, slashdot

Re:Hardware based monopolies need to go also

[mysidia]

Hardware unique identifiers that are used as a supply chain or service identification lockout.

Why? They are needed for anti-theft and to discourage trafficking. If someone steals my cellphone; I am happy that I can get my cellphone carrier to add the IMEI to a blacklist, which means no end user will benefit from my device having been stolen.

Re:Hardware based monopolies need to go also

[Aristos Mazer]

I agree that hardware locks and right to repair are in conflict, but I don't agree with your solution. We need another way.

I buy some products specifically because they are locked down, which means I can trust what is on them to a greater degree than something that can be reprogrammed. I push some family members towards the products that are restricted in functionality because I know they can't mess them up -- not by some accidental button pushing, not by downloading something from the network. And for security, signed unique certs before the software can run on this device that cannot be replaced? There are definitely times when I want that -- and on some of my personal devices.

I very much appreciate the walled garden for a wide range of operations, and I definitely appreciate a tool that does exactly what it is designed to do. I also like having other devices that are wide open. They are two different markets -- making one market illegal would not serve my interest.

Re:Hardware based monopolies need to go also

[R33P]

The only way consoles can be sold for their current (loss leader) prices is to have consumers make up the difference buying games. The manufacturers need to be able to predict that X consoles + Y games per console = profit. If you remove Y, then X consoles = loss. That's why they don't want you using your console for anything but licensed games.

So how about we keep that system, which works well for millions of consumers, and add a system where you can purchase a legitimate hardware unlock for Z. It would be trivial for manufacturers to work out Z, since it's essentially the same as their cut of the Y games per console. Then you could purchase a console, and if you wanted to unlock it, you could do so without any negative consequences. It would just cost you more, since you bought the console for a subsidized price to begin with.

Patents

[alzoron]

I believe that at the very least in exchange for a patent the patent holder should be required to provide complete documentation and detailed schematics. That alone would go a very long way to help people repair their own devices and I believe it also fits perfectly with the spirit of patent law.

Re:Patents

[Dragonslicer]

I believe that at the very least in exchange for a patent the patent holder should be required to provide complete documentation and detailed schematics.

In theory, they do. In order to be granted a patent, the inventor is required to include in the patent description everything that a person in the same industry ("person of ordinary skill in the art") would need to know to build the invention.

Whether or not that requirement is being properly enforced by the USPTO, well, that's a separate question.

Let's not confuse it with actually doing something

[argStyopa]

This is a resolution to initiate a study: the government equivalent of your parents saying "sure, we'll think about it".

That's all.
The anti-repair lobbying money won't start substantially until the study is completed.

And let's be totally candid here. The people cheering this study only look forward to it because they expect to be validated. Largely, they don't want simply to reveal facts...unless those facts agree with them.

What if the study actually determines that the best net economic result is to block private repair? Today's ardent supporters will just say it was rigged anyway.

renting = landlord pay for repairs that will fix

[Joe_Dragon]

renting = landlord pay for repairs that will fix it.

Should be called FSF Act

[Antique Geekmeister]

The idea that the client or purchaser of a product should have access to repair or to modify a product is the foundation of the Gnu Public License, the software licensing model published by the Free Software Foundation, whose business offices are in Massachusetts. It's also a state where the legislature mandated that government documents be in open formats That was around 2005, and led to profound political hardball, such as the creation of the mislabeled "Open Office XML" format, created by Microsoft by get past the new laws and which, functionally, Microsoft ignores to continue with proprietary and unstable document formats in its flagship "Office" products..

It will be fascinating to see this play out in a state with that kind of legislative history.

What if there's another way to look at it?

[sabbede]

Consider this: In a capitalist democracy everybody is a market player and everyone is a voter. Free markets generate their own feedback and control mechanisms, the "invisible hand" which can be seen as a rule-making emergent property. But markets are limited in the scope of participant behaviors that it can control as it is but one piece of the economy which is but one piece of society. When a problem arises in markets that cannot be resolved by normal market forces, market participants come together to establish formal rules to correct it and consent to be subject to those rules. Thus, government.

So, you can look at government as a product or extension of the free market's own corrective mechanisms. Or, because the sets of market and government participants are identical, you could say that both the market and government are just products of a free people working out the rules for how to be a society.

Re:Some manufacturers do have a point sometimes

[flink]

If that's possible, then they've designed a bad keyless entry system. The security should be contingent on a secret held in the key dongle, not the process to pair it.

Especially if the OEM won't repair it.

[anon mouse-cow-aard]

Not a dupe, but highly correlated issue. Where the lifespan of equipment that can be responsibly used is limited by it's software support lifespan: https://ask.slashdot.org/story... Someone builds a 100K$ piece of equipment using a windows 7 workstation as a front-end, and in 2020 it's a paperweight?

Re:Especially if the OEM won't repair it.

[drinkypoo]

Apple won't even fix an iMac pro for money if you break it by opening it, let alone sell you the parts to do so...

Re:Some manufacturers do have a point sometimes

[tsqr]

I Iost one of my car key dongles and found I had a choice. I could go to the dealer, pay a lot of money for a replacement, and pay a lot more for the programming; or, I could go to an auto locksmith, pay less for the replacement, and have the programming thrown in at no extra charge.

Going to a dealer is almost always a poor choice if an alternative is available.

Re:Some manufacturers do have a point sometimes

[mysidia]

it becomes possible for criminals to buy all the tools, parts and manuals to do the exact thing as above minus the ID checks and then use that to access and steal cars.

No..... They can be secure about those things without making it hard for drivers to program their own keys, after having it cut by a professional.

The ability for a service center or locksmith to make keys to your car stems from the fact that the manufacturers have a global database containing each vehicle they manufactured AND the keycode the factory locks shipped with, AND various dealers share access to the database through a subscription service that their service centers, independent service centers, and automotive locksmiths are allowed to subscribe to. So the dealer has access to this subscription service where they type in the Manufacturer, Model, VIN number and some other details, and a query is made to the corresponding database that retrieves the required codes.

Unfortunately.... if the Keyfob has an immobilizer, or is one of those fancy new all-digital keys... Typically it is locked down so only the authorized dealer can program a key; the Locksmith can access the database and cut a physical key --- OR even change the physical locks on the car to a new customer-specific code that's now different from factory, but the manufacturers are ridiculous about their programming procedures to learn a new set of keys, and there's really no legitimate excuse for this situation ---- other than they want to charge exorbitant rates like $1000 to replace a key.

Also, since a car thief is unlikely to have a service center, they can't subscribe to the database and get the keycodes. Even if they did it'd be a super-inefficient way to steal cars, and someone would put two and two together that keycodes were being requested for cars by a certain subscriber that then turned up stolen.

Re:Let's not confuse it with actually doing someth

[Dragonslicer]

This is a resolution to initiate a study: the government equivalent of your parents saying "sure, we'll think about it".

That's all. The anti-repair lobbying money won't start substantially until the study is completed.

It's doubtful that the lobbying would matter. When Right to Repair for cars went to a referendum, it got 86% support. I don't think they could spend enough advertising dollars to get 40% of the voters to change their minds.

And let's be totally candid here. The people cheering this study only look forward to it because they expect to be validated. Largely, they don't want simply to reveal facts...unless those facts agree with them.

What if the study actually determines that the best net economic result is to block private repair? Today's ardent supporters will just say it was rigged anyway.

That would be the bigger concern. Not the rigged part, that's just your paranoia and/or projecting, but ignoring the results of the study. The results won't just be about out-of-pocket costs, though, but will include things like environmental impact. This is Massachusetts, where there's a much higher proportion of scientists and engineers than most other parts of the country, so they'll do more than a superficial study, and hopefully they'll follow the results.

Re:Some manufacturers do have a point sometimes

[Immerman]

The pairing process is generally what puts the secret into the key dongle (or alternately, the corresponding secret into the car)

If the secret is hard-wired into the dongle, then there would be no way to make a duplicate key at all.

If the process for pairing the two is public, what stops me from walking up to your car with a new key, pairing the two, and driving it away?

You could design a process that requires a valid key to clone, but that tends to make it extremely expensive to create a new key when the last old key is lost, which happens.

I'm not trying to argue in favor of manufacturer exclusivity here - criminals will get their hands on the process regardless, but I think you're glossing over some serious technical details.

Re:Some manufacturers do have a point sometimes

[Immerman]

So, spend a minute with your new car and make a third key, what's the problem?

Once upon a time, new computers came with reinstall discs to get it back to factory settings when the hard drive eventually failed or was upgraded. Nowadays it tends to be just a hidden partition on the disk instead - which is lost along with the rest of the drive in the case of a hardware failure (or sufficiently severe software one) They (usually) offer a convenient route to make your own physical discs, though I've seen systems that restrict you to doing so only once (what's the logic on *that* one?)

It's a cheapskate move designed to exploit people's laziness and procrastination for profit, but at least the responsible owner has an easy option to protect themselves from it.

Government interference is what CAUSED the problem

[Cajun Hell]

Government should largely stay out of the free market, save where staying out clearly makes things worse.

Well, that won't ever happen, because usually the biggest barrier to repairing things is copyright law with the bonus twist of DMCA. The government is already neck-deep in preventing a free market from happening.

It is silly to suggest the government should abstain from putting loaded guns in manufacturers' faces saying "make it maintainable" ..

..Unless you're going to stop putting a loaded gun in consumers' faces saying "don't try to maintain that."

John Deere initiated the violence

[Cajun Hell]

They want to buy John Deere because they are better, and they want to enact state violence against the company

John Deere went crying to mama and enacted state violence first, by using DMCA.

Consumers are just asking to use retaliatory violence. The escalation to the use of force was initiated by John Deere.

Don't go around punching people! But if someone punches you, you should strike back, and harder.

Good point

[rsilvergun]

anyone else remember the suicide batteries in Capcom & Sega arcade boards? That should be illegal. Come up with a better way to do DRM than killing the board I spent $3-5k on.

Doesn't matter if manufacturer throws them away

[captaindomon]

Right to repair doesn't matter when the manufacturer designs them as disposable, and their "warranty" is a "replacement warranty". You'll never be able to force manufacturers to design a crappier product held together by screws and zip ties, when it makes more sense to build one welded together or filled with epoxy. I don't want a phone, frankly, where you can remove the buttons with a screwdriver. I want a phone that is compact and feels really sturdy, like one piece, backed by the manufacturer being willing to just swap it out if it fails.

Re:Some manufacturers do have a point sometimes

[Rhipf]

This example shows the main reason manufacturers don't want to release repair information. Do you really think it costs $90 to make the new key (even $30 would be highly stretching the manufacturing costs)? Is it really so hard to program a new key that it should cost $100 to do it? If the manufacturer didn't have a monopoly on these items I'm sure the cost would be significantly less.

What about the right to refuse repair?

[TomGreenhaw]

Let's say you just had a battery replaced in your iPhone, and then a part with a know manufacturing defect that only can be obtained from Apple fails. Does Apple have the right to refuse repair of the phone or supply the parts?

I know there would be an outcry if Ford refused repair of a car just out of warranty because you had the oil changed somewhere besides a Ford dealer, and yet this is Apple policy.

This just happened to me. I've retired my Apple Watch and iPhone in Favor of a Galaxy Note and Gear Frontier watch.