Bundestag passes Amendment allowing all German states to use phone-detection cameras

Germany’s Bundestag passed the Fifth Amendment to the Road Traffic Act on March 26, 2026, and the law took effect on July 1, 2026.

The amendment creates a uniform federal legal basis that lets all 16 German states procure and operate Monocam phone-detection cameras without passing individual state laws. States that waited years for a federal legal basis can now move directly to procurement and deployment. Before the change, no paragraph in federal road traffic law addressed automated phone-detection enforcement.

Heise Online reports that nationwide deployment requires a federal legal basis that does not currently exist. Federal Transport Minister Steffen Bilger supports nationwide use of cellphone cameras such as Monocam and framed the push as a response to multiple state governments ready to deploy but awaiting the federal legal foundation. Multiple state governments lobbied the federal transport ministry for a unified enforcement framework.

A Monocam unit mounts high on an overpass and captures vehicle interiors through the windshield. Onboard software scans each image for a mobile device and a driver hand or arm position consistent with holding one.

When both criteria are met, the system flags the image and sends it to trained police officers, who make the final decision before any fine.

Holding a phone while driving brings a €100 fine and one demerit point. Causing a crash while holding a phone brings a €200 fine and a one-month license suspension.

Phone calls using a hands-free system, built-in system, or Bluetooth headset are allowed under Section 23(1a) of the Road Traffic Regulations. The main prohibited act under that provision is picking up or holding an electronic device while driving.

Rhineland-Palatinate was the only German state running Monocam units under regular enforcement before the federal amendment. The state permanently authorized Monocam by state law in February 2025 after test phases drew legal challenges rejected by a regional court in Trier.

Regular operations started in April 2025, and the Trier unit alone recorded over 300 phone-at-the-wheel violations during the first months of full deployment. A Trier unit documented 327 violations, and a second installation on the A60 near Mainz logged 941 during the pilot window.

In the first half of 2026, the Trier Police Headquarters recorded nearly 700 violations. Rhineland-Palatinate tested Monocam in Trier and Mainz in 2022, and the trial identified 1,268 violations referred to the central fine office in Speyer.

Rhineland-Palatinate plans to assign a dedicated Monocam unit to each of its five regional police commands. For regular operations, the state bought five cameras for €200,000, according to Trierischer Volksfreund.

Matthias Emmerich, head of the Trier Police Inspectorate, said cell phone use near announced cameras fell by around 70% during the test phase. During operation, the system does not learn; police trained it once and it only does what it is told. Software compares images with a database of around 20,000 reference images.

It was trained once by us as the police, and it basically only does what we tell it to do. — Matthias Emmerich, head of the Trier Police Inspectorate, told SWR

The camera initially records all drivers before any suspicion, affecting the right to informational self-determination (the right to control what happens to one’s personal data) and requiring clear statutory authorization. Since March 2025, Rhineland-Palatinate has had a legal basis in Section 30(8) of its Police and Regulatory Authorities Act, though scholars dispute state authority.

The Koblenz Higher Regional Court ruled on Oct. 10, 2025, in case 2 ORbs 31 SsRs 158/23, finding that images taken before the state law existed lacked a legal basis for recording drivers without cause.

The state government requires that images captured without any initial suspicion be erased at once, and flagged pictures that officers do not confirm after manual review face the same deletion rule. Fine recipients can challenge the penalty by lodging a formal objection within two weeks of the notice being served, which puts the evidence before a court for examination.

It has not been documented how affected people can routinely obtain the image or what technical requirements apply to timestamps and data integrity.

The system architecture scans everything but retains nothing unless a violation is flagged, a design intended to limit data exposure and survive constitutional scrutiny. Privacy advocates have filed GDPR-based objections, yet none have overturned the system’s output. Courts in Rhineland-Palatinate have repeatedly confirmed that camera-produced evidence is admissible.

State governments cited a yearly figure of more than 1,000 German crashes linked to drivers handling electronic devices. Multiple state governments lobbied the federal transport ministry for a unified enforcement framework. The German Road Safety Council has long advocated nationwide AI monitoring of the cellphone ban.

Auto Club Europa recorded clearly illegal smartphone use at an average rate of 3.3% across more than 300 spot checks in built-up areas.

The Netherlands started national use of smart phone-detection cameras in November 2020 and was the first European country to issue automated fines for phone use at the wheel. Dutch cameras detected more than 73,000 violations in a single reporting period using 40 cameras. An earlier Dutch reporting window showed about €5 million in fines over four months.

Dutch authorities plan to expand from 40 to 50 cameras by the end of 2026, with further growth projected through 2030. Belgium has studied a parallel legal structure, with road safety institute Vias campaigning for adoption and identifying GDPR compliance as the primary design challenge.

The German Traffic Court Conference states that official figures on distraction-caused crashes are unreliable and that unreported cases number high. The conference’s 2024 figures cite 1,450 injuries in crashes involving suspected distraction from electronic devices.

No camera locations have been determined, and whether units can be placed in urban areas or on rural roads depends on how the federal law is drafted. So far, units have been installed on various highway and interstate overpasses. A federal law would need to address deployment locations, data collected, review procedures, retention periods, and legal recourse.

A camera cannot determine the legal context from a gesture by itself. Human review can lessen the intrusion’s severity, but confirmation bias undermines it when officers accept the software’s suggestion unchecked.

The cost of nationwide camera operations remains unclear, with no estimates for staff, maintenance, and administrative proceedings and no rule on who would pay. Since traffic enforcement is a state responsibility, procurement and operating expenses would likely come from police budgets.

Rhineland-Palatinate has not released figures on how many captured images proved unusable, how many alerts were thrown out after review, or how many drivers’ challenges succeeded. Courts in Rhineland-Palatinate have repeatedly confirmed that camera-produced evidence is admissible. Privacy advocates have filed GDPR-based objections, yet none have overturned the system’s output.

The Conference of Transport Ministers discussed uniform federal legislation on traffic monitoring on October 21 and 22 in Hohenschwangau. The state holding the conference chair and Lower Saxony submitted a draft resolution on uniform federal legislation. A VMK vote would only be a political agreement among state departments, while the Bundestag and Bundesrat would need to pass a federal law.