France proposed adding software identification numbers to 32 UN vehicle regulations

A proposal from the expert from France, tabled at the 132nd session of the World Forum’s general safety working party in Geneva, would amend 32 UN regulations in one document to introduce software update references and identification. The paper was distributed on July 15 and taken under other business.

The mechanism is a per-regulation software identification number — an R18SWIN for the anti-theft regulation, an R39SWIN for the speedometer regulation, and so on through the list — defined by reference to the consolidated resolution on vehicle construction, as amended by its eighth revision. UN R156, the software update regulation, already defines the identification number this builds on.

The regulations named run from anti-theft protection, speedometers and devices for indirect vision through the general construction of buses and coaches, the identification of controls and tell-tales, blind spot information, event data recorders, and the drowsiness and distraction warning regulations. The paper also sets out the criteria France used to select them: it treats every regulation containing provisions for electronic systems as relevant even where those systems are not mandatory, and every regulation containing provisions for tell-tales or optical and acoustic signals, on the ground that many vehicles manage those through the infotainment system.

Two other points are worth reading. The draft text would let a manufacturer seek a new approval to distinguish software versions intended for vehicles already registered from versions intended for new vehicles, and provides that production is not considered definitively discontinued where a manufacturer intends to obtain later extensions for software updates to registered vehicles. And the paper notes that some of the regulations it covers apply only to category L vehicles, which are not currently within the scope of R156.

The proposal is tabled for discussion; nothing has been agreed.