Mazda Slaps Developer With Cease-and-Desist for DIY Smart Home Integration

Modern cars are indeed very smart, though no car is perfect. One enterprising developer decided to make his Mazda a little smarter through code and share his work with others like him online. Unfortunately, the automaker took issue with his improvements, and hit the project with a Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) claim, forcing it to be taken down.

Developer Brandon Rothweiler authored Mazda-specific integrations for Home Assistant, an open-source platform that can be used to run and establish interoperability between a variety of connected devices. Rothweiler's code plugged into Mazda's Application Programming Interface or API, allowing owners to create and share a number of seemingly inoffensive, convenience-minded functions, like checking and alerting fuel levels before a daily commute, or remotely unlocking and firing up the car when outside temperature drops below a certain threshold, as Ars Technica summed up in its coverage.

Mazda caught wind, however, and served Home Assistant, GitHub (where the software was hosted), and Rothweiler cease and desist orders, citing a number of infringements. The automaker argued that Rothweiler's work contained code that violated its copyrights; used its "proprietary API information" to create more code; and that the integrations provided functionality identical to what currently exists in Mazda's own mobile apps. The Drive reached out to Mazda to clarify its position on these claims, and will update this story should we learn anything.