Driver-Facing Cameras — Would You Quit Over One?

[RoadRunnerRick]

My carrier rolled out driver facing cameras (inward-facing AI cams) this year.

They keep calling it “coaching” and “safety.”
In reality, it feels like I’m being watched like a toddler for 11 hours a day.

What gets me is the AI alerts. It’ll hit me with “distracted driving” when I’m doing normal stuff:

• checking mirrors
• scanning traffic at an on-ramp
• looking at the dash for a second
• touching the ELD or infotainment

And the policy is always fuzzy. Nobody can give a straight answer on:

• Is it always recording or only recording “events”?
• Does it record audio?
• Who can pull clips? Safety? Dispatch? A third party?
• How long do they keep footage?
• Is it “coaching,” or can it lead to write-ups and termination?

I’m not anti-safety. If a driver-facing camera actually protects drivers from false claims or helps prove you weren’t on your phone, that matters.

But I also know a lot of us have a line in the sand.

So I’m curious where everyone stands on this:

1. Would you quit a job over driver facing cameras?
2. Have you ever had an inward-facing camera help you (claim, accident, close call, complaint)?
3. Is your issue the camera itself, or how the company uses it?
4. What policy would make it acceptable (event-only, no audio, limited access, short retention, driver review allowed, etc.)?

If you reply, add: company driver or O/O, and whether yours is always-on or event-based. I’m trying to figure out what’s normal and what’s over the line.

Where’s your line?

 

[389 Hood]

Tell your boss to put cameras in his house and bedroom so you can watch him scratch his nuts 24/7.

When the company put the cameras in our trucks, we had 15 out of 15 drivers park it. They gave in real quick and only used them forward facing. The drivers side got a solid cover that snaps over the face of the camera. I put a few drops of Super Glue in the audio opening to pretty much make any talking unintelligible.

 

[krelithous]

AGREE with 389!!! and when they don't want you to idle shut the A/C and heat off in your bosses office and house!!! imagine how many more ways they have to treat drivers like shit...

 

[gearjammer]

the government today treats you like a toddler with a very low IQ, if you don't want to be treated that way try another profession I gave it up after more thn30 years I am and always was about safety but the government is always about control and face it the government now controls every facet of a professionals life and I was just not built to take their BS, I enjoyed my life on the road but would NEVER consider going back to it today

 

[Duck]

Tell your boss to put cameras in his house and bedroom so you can watch him scratch his nuts 24/7.

When the company put the cameras in our trucks, we had 15 out of 15 drivers park it. They gave in real quick and only used them forward facing. The drivers side got a solid cover that snaps over the face of the camera. I put a few drops of Super Glue in the audio opening to pretty much make any talking unintelligible.

I just put a little piece of cardboard over the inside lens, held on with a rubber band. That way I don't leave any adhesive residue on it from tape. I'd understand if some guy gets fired for using spray paint, glue or duct tape to cover up the lens.

We weren't supposed to cover up the inside lens but I did it anyway. It became like a litmus test for the company. If they'd fire me for that, they're no longer a decent company to work for anyway, and that's how I'd know.

They never said anything to me about it though.

I purposely left the camera covered up when I left it at the shop too, to test the mechanics and see if they were worth knowing too.

The only times I removed the cardboard and rubber band was when the truck was assigned to someone else and they just had me use it locally or something. I'll take a stand myself but I can't do it on anyone else's behalf.


The cameras would detect a shock and send a video clip to the safety guy every time you hook up a trailer and slam into the pin. I knew that because a red LED light would come on and stay on until it uploads the video once or twice a day.

I never removed the cardboard when I hooked up a trailer. Sometimes I'd let the rubber band snap tight against the camera when I was putting it on, and that would trigger it too.


I didn't have any issue with the forward facing camera though. I wasn't the slightest bit concerned I'd be the at-fault driver in a wreck.

 

[389 Hood]

I got dinged once for a hard braking event. They called me on it and I told them to look at the camera. It was one of those Do or Die red light moments. It was a pretty spaced out intersection and I just felt better stopping for it.

@Duck on slamming the pin. Why would want to do that? Get under plate, inflate the bags and slide right into place. You don't get a 'high hook' that way and you don't put undue stress on the jaws and pin.

 

[Duck]

@Duck on slamming the pin. Why would want to do that? Get under plate, inflate the bags and slide right into place. You don't get a 'high hook' that way and you don't put undue stress on the jaws and pin.

Automatic transmission. You have very little control. It won't do anything til you get a certain amount of pedal on it, then suddenly it takes off & slams the shit out of the pin.

 

[389 Hood]

Now I understand. Automatics can make anyone look like a rookie, unless you use both feet on the pedals.

I'm pretty sure Eaton used a centrifugal coupling, while Allison transmissions, which is a real transmission uses a torque converter.

 

[Duck]

I got dinged once for a hard braking event. They called me on it and I told them to look at the camera. It was one of those Do or Die red light moments. It was a pretty spaced out intersection and I just felt better stopping for it.

One time I was headed home with an empty trailer on a cold, windy day.

About 20 miles from home, wind blew somebody's trash can out into the 2 lane road I was on, right as an oncoming car was approaching.

I decided to full stop get out and move the can, rather than just slow down so the oncoming car could go by and I could use his lane to go around the trash can.

I got out & tossed the can into the ditch on the downwind side of the road so it wouldn't end up back in the road where it could cause an accident or ding up someone's car.

That whole thing was uploaded to the safety guy because of the quick stop with cold, grabby trailer brakes.

I got called into the office next time I was in Iowa and they said I should have gone around the trash can instead of getting out & moving it. They said I could've been run over by a car.

I said "my dad taught me how to watch for cars coming when I was 4 years old"



A few months ago, am Illinois state trooper stopped on I-55 just south of I-80 to move something that was in the road, and he got hit by a car and killed.

Every state agency with a Facebook account was spamming everyone with PSA's about the Move Over law. The "slow down and/or move to the other lane if there's an emergency vehicle on the shoulder" law that most states have.

How about they just hire cops who know better than to step out into the HAMMER LANE traffic on the interstate, at night, leaving his array of super bright strobe lights on the right shoulder? The guy who hit him DID move over.

 

[GAnthony]

well tell you what, up here of recent, we have had 2 school bus crashes...one was empty, except for the driver and monitor (a person that gets out and checks under and all around the bus for any kid that might have fallen,,and this job is state required) , and the driver ran over a pedestrian in a cross walk and killed him..driver has been charged for SEVERAL infractions

the next, bus had 7 kids, and ran into a ditch...

driver was charged with distracted driving, apparently he (age 76) leaned over to get something on the console, maybe his coffee..???

both these crashes, the buses have in cab cameras..thank god they do.

if anyone does not like driver facing camera's, tough shit for you

we as (either former trucker like myself) or citizens NEED to know the driver was capable of the job and did nothing wrong.

as well as the companies...do not forget, "nuclear verdicts" are an all too real thing that bury trucking companies, AND the driver(s) in civil suits.

everyone wants to know what the driver did, wrong, or right, at the time of ANY accident.

don't like facing camera's..??

then GTFO and flip burgers.

 

[Jasper]

They are coming to sheetz tankers. So I am retiring a little early, want nothing to do with them.

 

[Electric Chicken]

I ran an inboard camera when I was doing Uber to cover my ass, but it's a camera I have control over and there's no corporate goon to tell me I picked my nose or sipped coffee at the wrong time.

It only existed to record customer interactions.

 

[Electric Chicken]

well tell you what, up here of recent, we have had 2 school bus crashes...one was empty, except for the driver and monitor (a person that gets out and checks under and all around the bus for any kid that might have fallen,,and this job is state required) , and the driver ran over a pedestrian in a cross walk and killed him..driver has been charged for SEVERAL infractions

the next, bus had 7 kids, and ran into a ditch...

driver was charged with distracted driving, apparently he (age 76) leaned over to get something on the console, maybe his coffee..???

both these crashes, the buses have in cab cameras..thank god they do.

if anyone does not like driver facing camera's, tough shit for you

we as (either former trucker like myself) or citizens NEED to know the driver was capable of the job and did nothing wrong.

as well as the companies...do not forget, "nuclear verdicts" are an all too real thing that bury trucking companies, AND the driver(s) in civil suits.

everyone wants to know what the driver did, wrong, or right, at the time of ANY accident.

don't like facing camera's..??

then GTFO and flip burgers.

Easy to say when you're retired.

 

[Duck]

well tell you what, up here of recent, we have had 2 school bus crashes...one was empty, except for the driver and monitor (a person that gets out and checks under and all around the bus for any kid that might have fallen,,and this job is state required) , and the driver ran over a pedestrian in a cross walk and killed him..driver has been charged for SEVERAL infractions

the next, bus had 7 kids, and ran into a ditch...

driver was charged with distracted driving, apparently he (age 76) leaned over to get something on the console, maybe his coffee..???

both these crashes, the buses have in cab cameras..thank god they do.

if anyone does not like driver facing camera's, tough shit for you

we as (either former trucker like myself) or citizens NEED to know the driver was capable of the job and did nothing wrong.

as well as the companies...do not forget, "nuclear verdicts" are an all too real thing that bury trucking companies, AND the driver(s) in civil suits.

everyone wants to know what the driver did, wrong, or right, at the time of ANY accident.

don't like facing camera's..??

then GTFO and flip burgers.

Why mandate inward facing cameras to keep people safe when they can't even successfully mandate CDL drivers even be capable of reading road signs?

If a driver's abilities can't be trusted without a camera, they shouldn't be hiring them.

 

[GAnthony]

Why mandate inward facing cameras to keep people safe when they can't even successfully mandate CDL drivers even be capable of reading road signs?

If a driver's abilities can't be trusted without a camera, they shouldn't be hiring them.

i trust no one anymore.

i want cameras everywhere, once i get onto the sidewalk, or road.

i want cameras in ALL commercial vehicles, inside and outside ALL buildings as well..of course at least none in any restrooms.

trust no one

 

[GAnthony]

Easy to say when you're retired.

easy to cuz its the truth too.

if a driver or any other worker does not like cameras on him/her all day long in the course of doing his/her job, tough shit.

it guards against theft, assaults, and other things that be trouble some, especially a driver that is a moron.

 

[389 Hood]

Pretty hard to argue with any of that, because it's true. Especially for us old farts. These pussy kids have beaten old ladies and men over their heads for their wallets or purses. Wimpy little pieces of shit. Let them continue to kill each other off in the streets of the slum blue cities. No one will miss any of them...until they FAFO with the wrong old man or woman.

My wife always picks on me because I carry everywhere I go. Shopping, Walmart, dinner, walking the dog, wherever. But she knows that if I ever tell her to get on the floor, she has a real good chance of coming out alive. I have NO issues with cameras anywhere. Except bathrooms. Some things in life really have to be private.

 

[PurelyParis]

Hello everyone....!

 

[Uncle Birchy]

So my company added an AI inward camera this year.
Supposed to “coach better habits” but half the time it just yells at me for checking mirrors.

I’m all for safety… but no one likes being watched like a toddler 11 hours a day.

Anyone here actually leave a job over one of these?
Or have they ever actually helped you in a situation?

Where’s your line in the sand?

Nope thats the "Standard" nowaydays...

That said doesnt stop you from throwing dirty shirt or jacket over the dashboard "covering" it up as I diplay in this "Trucking With Karl" Video..

Only one Company complained about it was "Millis Transfer"

 

[GAnthony]

Pretty hard to argue with any of that, because it's true. Especially for us old farts. These pussy kids have beaten old ladies and men over their heads for their wallets or purses. Wimpy little pieces of shit. Let them continue to kill each other off in the streets of the slum blue cities. No one will miss any of them...until they FAFO with the wrong old man or woman.

My wife always picks on me because I carry everywhere I go. Shopping, Walmart, dinner, walking the dog, wherever. But she knows that if I ever tell her to get on the floor, she has a real good chance of coming out alive. I have NO issues with cameras anywhere. Except bathrooms. Some things in life really have to be private.

i been carrying everywhere too, since i got my permit, back in '21.....in fact, got my renewal, this past June. i do leave my gun in my car when i go to a doctors office, or for x-rays and such.

but if this world was a much better place, neither of us would feel the need to carry.

i have been "pro-cameras everywhere" for the longest time...if you ain't doing nuffin' wrong, then you have no problems...once anyone steps foot on the sidewalk, it is public space.........your home, yard is YOUR private space, and if you want a camera or 2 or more then you can do so.


i feel it is the only way to combat crime, and nail the SOB's in court.

of course too, in "blue states", even such as mine, the libtard judges many times just "slap the criminals on the wrist" and set'em free.