Digital License Plates

[Roadwarriors79]

So digital license plates are a thing now. They are being tested in California and Arizona. Wondering what your thoughts are on them.

http://amp.sacbee.com/news/local/transportation/back-seat-driver/article211828814.html

https://www.abc15.com/news/national/digital-license-plates-arizona-california-already-testing-them

[index]

I wonder how easily these are going to get broken.

[Max Rockatansky]

Embossed painted plates will always be cooler.  It's bad enough States like Arizona use vinyl or that there are even plastic plates you see from Iowa.  Kind of has me curious how quickly someone will come up with a way to hack the digital plates.  The local news in Fresno had a feature this morning, I thought the feature to display a car as stolen was kind of neat. 

[abefroman329]

So we're skipping over the barcoded license plates from Back to the Future Part II, then?

[Scott5114]

God damn, not everything needs to be a freakin' monitor.

[briantroutman]

When I first saw the thread title, I assumed it was a story on plates with barcodes (or QR-like codes) that would be more easily and reliably read by police equipment, toll plaza scanners, etc. But this business of installing dedicated electronic screens for the purpose of displaying an image of a license plate is pure nonsense.

Sure, many fixtures have been converted from physical signage to digital screens (fast food menu boards, transit vehicle route number displays), but the technology makes sense in those applications because the information these signs display frequently changes (prices change, items go out of stock, busses are reassigned to other routes, etc.). But a plate number is, for all intents and purposes, permanent. Even in fleets: Maybe this varies from state to state, but I'm not aware of taxi companies or limo services constantly juggling plates between cars...to the point that installing a $700 digital plate on each car would be worth the cost. The only such plate juggling I've seen has been at car dealerships where dealer plates, untied to a specific vehicle, are quickly slapped (frequently magneted) on the backs of cars for test drives or to shuttle them from lot to lot.

Regarding registration stickers and the costs and logistics associated with them: Pennsylvania has successfully transitioned to a stickerless registration system, and the 2011 report that led to this transition cited Connecticut, New Jersey, and Quebec as having previously moved to a stickerless system with positive outcomes, and these states/provinces responded to PA researchers that they have no intention of going back to issuing registration stickers. (Perhaps others have gone stickerless since.)

But getting to the heart of the matter, this digital license plate farce may be profitable for its creators if they can manage (however briefly) to make it the "flavor of the month"  status symbol for the idle 1%. If that happens, I'm sure they'll sell thousands in California alone. At $700 a pop, they'll rake in the cash until the fad they created becomes passé, and then they'll start looking for their next Pet Rock.

[oscar]

But getting to the heart of the matter, this digital license plate farce may be profitable for its creators if they can manage (however briefly) to make it the "flavor of the month"  status symbol for the idle 1%. If that happens, I'm sure they'll sell thousands in California alone. At $700 a pop, they'll rake in the cash until the fad they created becomes passé, and then they'll start looking for their next Pet Rock.

If there are no effective controls to prevent users from tampering with the data displayed on the plate, that would make it easier to mimic the insta-change license plates seen in chase scenes in James Bond flicks.

[MNHighwayMan]

Embossed painted plates will always be cooler.  It's bad enough States like Arizona use vinyl or that there are even plastic plates you see from Iowa.

Plastic Iowa plates? My vehicle, and all of my parents' vehicles, and everyone else I know all have aluminum plates. What are you talking about?

[Max Rockatansky]

Embossed painted plates will always be cooler.  It's bad enough States like Arizona use vinyl or that there are even plastic plates you see from Iowa.

Plastic Iowa plates? My vehicle, and all of my parents' vehicles, and everyone else I know all have aluminum plates. What are you talking about?

One of my workers is moving to Iowa.  She got her plates sent to her via the mail and they were plastic.  One of them already pulled apart in a wind squall.  They didn't appear to be a temporary tag either.  Sound like anything you've encountered maybe with a temp tag?

[MNHighwayMan]

Embossed painted plates will always be cooler.  It's bad enough States like Arizona use vinyl or that there are even plastic plates you see from Iowa.

Plastic Iowa plates? My vehicle, and all of my parents' vehicles, and everyone else I know all have aluminum plates. What are you talking about?

One of my workers is moving to Iowa.  She got her plates sent to her via the mail and they were plastic.  One of them already pulled apart in a wind squall.  They didn't appear to be a temporary tag either.  Sound like anything you've encountered maybe with a temp tag?

Hmm, no. Then again, the last car my parents registered was about a year ago, and they got metal plates for it. Maybe things have changed recently and I was/am simply unaware of the change.

[SP Cook]

Allowing people to "display their own message" which I suppose would be like "F*** you" to the guy behind him is crazy. 

The only advantages I see about this are two related ones.  First, as it relates to law enforcement.  If the thing has GPS like capability, then that is good; and if it is addressable, a stolen car could display "STOLEN CAR" which is a pretty good clue to most motorists to call 911.  Second, many DMVs are very poorly run (the WSJ had a good outline of this a couple of months back) and 1000s of people who have no idea they are not legal are driving around with suspensions, justified or not, for unpaid tickets, parking, no insurance, child support, toll by plate (which should be abolished), whatever.  A rouge car (or a linked DL) could just blank out the plate if there is an issue.

The negative side, is just the reverse.  Big Brother can just push a button and void your car. 

[vdeane]

If the thing has GPS like capability, then that is good

It does, and I certainly don't want a device on my car tracking my every move.  At least with cell phones, there's a middleman (the phone company, and you can always turn the phone off).  I don't need some government official or computer program deciding that my roadgeek clinching trips look "suspicious" and invite cops to pull me over, FBI agents to raid my apartment, or something else.  I can see it all now: "well Valerie, nobody in their right mind would drive from Jacksonville to Rochester via Key West, Nashville, Akron, and Harrisburg, stopping only for food/gas/lodging, so obviously we need to tear apart everything you own to see if you're up to no good or not".

[roadman]

Another solution in search of a problem.

[renegade]

I told a representative of the company exactly what I thought about those at the North American International Auto Show.  I didn't hold back.  I am not going to pay $700 plus $7 per month in subscription fees to advertise for anyone.. They can stick them where the sun doesn't shine

Embossed painted plates will always be cooler.  It's bad enough States like Arizona use vinyl or that there are even plastic plates you see from Iowa.  Kind of has me curious how quickly someone will come up with a way to hack the digital plates.  The local news in Fresno had a feature this morning, I thought the feature to display a car as stolen was kind of neat.

I didn't know Arizona and Iowa have switched from metal.

[DaBigE]

Another solution in search of a problem.

Agreed. This will be a hacker's wet dream. And getting rear-ended just got that much more expensive. Just imagine the headaches for a driver following one of these things malfunctioning at night. The state might save a little money in admin costs, but when one of these things break, I bet it's gong to be on the owner of the car. IMO, the better use of money would be on ALPRs and eliminating stickers altogether, but keep the "old school" plates. Save the digital signs for billboards and prices in Kohls and Sears.

[kalvado]

If plates are owned by a driver...
AN interesting scheme (well tried elsewhere): unbolt plates from a parked car and hide them within walking distance. Leave bitcoin wallet address so that owner can pay to hear where plates are...
Of course, things may be traceable by police - but what happens with plateless car? Keeping it parked during investigation is a simple option..
Doesn't work with Al plates as those are cheap enough to replace... Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

[Scott5114]

Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

This is supposedly why Missouri places its stickers in the center of the plate–people were cutting off the corners of other people's plates to steal the stickers.

[DaBigE]

If plates are owned by a driver...
AN interesting scheme (well tried elsewhere): unbolt plates from a parked car and hide them within walking distance. Leave bitcoin wallet address so that owner can pay to hear where plates are...
Of course, things may be traceable by police - but what happens with plateless car? Keeping it parked during investigation is a simple option..
Doesn't work with Al plates as those are cheap enough to replace... Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

I thought plates were always owned by the driver. At least in Wisconsin, if your plate becomes unreadable due to age (or in recent cases, self-destruction), the state requires the vehicle owner to buy a new plate.

[abefroman329]

If plates are owned by a driver...
AN interesting scheme (well tried elsewhere): unbolt plates from a parked car and hide them within walking distance. Leave bitcoin wallet address so that owner can pay to hear where plates are...
Of course, things may be traceable by police - but what happens with plateless car? Keeping it parked during investigation is a simple option..
Doesn't work with Al plates as those are cheap enough to replace... Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

I thought plates were always owned by the driver. At least in Wisconsin, if your plate becomes unreadable due to age (or in recent cases, self-destruction), the state requires the vehicle owner to buy a new plate.

It might vary state to state.  Are there still states where, if you sell the car, the plates stay with the car?  Georgia was like that until maybe 20 years ago.

[jeffandnicole]

If plates are owned by a driver...
AN interesting scheme (well tried elsewhere): unbolt plates from a parked car and hide them within walking distance. Leave bitcoin wallet address so that owner can pay to hear where plates are...
Of course, things may be traceable by police - but what happens with plateless car? Keeping it parked during investigation is a simple option..
Doesn't work with Al plates as those are cheap enough to replace... Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

I thought plates were always owned by the driver. At least in Wisconsin, if your plate becomes unreadable due to age (or in recent cases, self-destruction), the state requires the vehicle owner to buy a new plate.

To be technical, the plates are owned by the owner of the car.  The driver may have nothing to do with ownership. 

If the car is leased, at least here in NJ, the Leasee is the owner of the license plates; not the leaser, not the driver.

In states like Delaware, people literally 'own' license plates, and can actually sell them to others.  The State also has auctions sometimes for low-numbered plates, as they were distributed in order of plate number, so the lower the number the more valuable the plate.   In other states, the plates can't be transferred person-to-person.

[DaBigE]

If plates are owned by a driver...
AN interesting scheme (well tried elsewhere): unbolt plates from a parked car and hide them within walking distance. Leave bitcoin wallet address so that owner can pay to hear where plates are...
Of course, things may be traceable by police - but what happens with plateless car? Keeping it parked during investigation is a simple option..
Doesn't work with Al plates as those are cheap enough to replace... Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

I thought plates were always owned by the driver. At least in Wisconsin, if your plate becomes unreadable due to age (or in recent cases, self-destruction), the state requires the vehicle owner to buy a new plate.

To be technical, the plates are owned by the owner of the car.  The driver may have nothing to do with ownership. 

If the car is leased, at least here in NJ, the Leasee is the owner of the license plates; not the leaser, not the driver.

In states like Delaware, people literally 'own' license plates, and can actually sell them to others.  The State also has auctions sometimes for low-numbered plates, as they were distributed in order of plate number, so the lower the number the more valuable the plate.   In other states, the plates can't be transferred person-to-person.

Sorry, brain-fart...meant to say owner, not driver.

[Takumi]

If plates are owned by a driver...
AN interesting scheme (well tried elsewhere): unbolt plates from a parked car and hide them within walking distance. Leave bitcoin wallet address so that owner can pay to hear where plates are...
Of course, things may be traceable by police - but what happens with plateless car? Keeping it parked during investigation is a simple option..
Doesn't work with Al plates as those are cheap enough to replace... Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

I thought plates were always owned by the driver. At least in Wisconsin, if your plate becomes unreadable due to age (or in recent cases, self-destruction), the state requires the vehicle owner to buy a new plate.

It might vary state to state.  Are there still states where, if you sell the car, the plates stay with the car?  Georgia was like that until maybe 20 years ago.

I want to say California still does that.

[cjk374]

Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

This is supposedly why Missouri places its stickers in the center of the plate–people were cutting off the corners of other people's plates to steal the stickers.

Louisiana's plate stickers have the plate number printed on the sticker. Won't do any good to steal our corners.

When anything changes from static to digital, it goes from trouble-free to trouble-filled.

[mgk920]

Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

This is supposedly why Missouri places its stickers in the center of the plate–people were cutting off the corners of other people's plates to steal the stickers.

Louisiana's plate stickers have the plate number printed on the sticker. Won't do any good to steal our corners.

When anything changes from static to digital, it goes from trouble-free to trouble-filled.

New York has used window stickers (inside lower drivers' side corner) for many years now, too.  The stickers are the 'official' registration, the conventional plates are only there to make it easier to identify the car from a greater distance away.

Mike

[mgk920]

If plates are owned by a driver...
AN interesting scheme (well tried elsewhere): unbolt plates from a parked car and hide them within walking distance. Leave bitcoin wallet address so that owner can pay to hear where plates are...
Of course, things may be traceable by police - but what happens with plateless car? Keeping it parked during investigation is a simple option..
Doesn't work with Al plates as those are cheap enough to replace... Although I heard some states had to struggle with vandalized license plates so that thief could salvage expensive registration sticker.

I thought plates were always owned by the driver. At least in Wisconsin, if your plate becomes unreadable due to age (or in recent cases, self-destruction), the state requires the vehicle owner to buy a new plate.

OTOH, when I had to have a personalized plate on my car replaced a couple of years ago (minor collision damage), WisDOT charged me a whole $2 - and sent me a second plate as well.  I swear that just the postage to send the replacements to me had to be more than that!



OTOH, if my car had a regular-issue plate number, they would have also assigned a new number to it.

Mike