A long, drawn-out battle over "right to repair" from nearly a decade ago is heating up in Massachusetts as groups clash over a ballot question that would update an existing law and expand access to mechanical data related to vehicle maintenance and repair.
The dispute has once again pitted independent repair shops and aftermarket parts retailers against most major automakers, with both sides spending millions to tilt voters in their favor.
Massachusetts' right-to-repair law — enacted in 2013 and adopted a year later as a national standard by automakers and independent garages and retailers — mandates vehicle owners and independent repair shops have access to the same diagnostic and repair data that automakers make available to their franchised dealerships and certified repair facilities.
The initiative up for a vote in November would give vehicle owners and independent repair shops access to real-time mechanical data from telematics, systems that collect and wirelessly transmit information such as crash notifications, remote diagnostics and navigation from the vehicle to a remote server.