Law.com reports that after 16 years and litigation by three consumer safety
groups, the U.S. Department of Justice has made an online database
available to states and consumers to discover automobile fraud and to
provide new tools for law enforcement to investigate fraud, theft and
other crimes involving vehicles. The database will be available only through third-party providers, and will not be free. But this is at least a start. Here are excerpts from the article:
available for consumers on Jan. 30 and is accessible through
third-party, fee-for-service Web sites. The Office of Justice Programs'
Bureau of Justice Assistance administers NMVTIS in coordination with
the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
The system allows state motor vehicle administrators to verify and
exchange titling and brand data and provides law enforcement officials,
consumers and others with critical information regarding vehicle
histories. Consumers now have access to the vehicle's brand history,
odometer data and basic vehicle information and can be redirected to
the current state of record to access the full title record if
available. Law enforcement can track the vehicle's status from state to
state by accessing the system directly.
Last year, Public Citizen, joined by Consumers for Auto Reliability and
Safety (CARS) and Consumer Action, sued the Department of Justice in
federal court in San Francisco, asking the court to order the
government to implement the NMVTIS, which Congress had required 16
years ago.
In September, the court told DOJ it had until Jan. 30 to make the
information available on the Internet and to issue a rule requiring
states, insurance companies and junk yards to report safety
information.
The information to be made available on Jan. 30 is still incomplete and
covers less than two-thirds of U.S. vehicles, according to Public
Citizen. That is because insurers and junk yards have until March 31 to
begin reporting data. Currently, 10 states are not reporting vehicle
data at all, while two states that are — New York and California — are
attempting to prevent public access to that data.
Ultimately, with full participation from all 50 states and the District
of Columbia, NMVTIS will prevent stolen motor vehicles, including
clones, from entering into interstate commerce, protect states and
consumers from fraud, reduce the use of stolen vehicles for illicit
purposes including fundraising for criminal enterprises, and provide
consumer protection from unsafe vehicles, according to DOJ.
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