The hype surrounding the recent release of the new iPhone 4S earlier this month included excitement over the phone’s voice-activated personal assistant, nicknamed “Siri.” A much-touted feature was how Siri can be used to dictate text messages without typing — or read incoming texts aloud.
Sounds like that solves the issue of texting behind the wheel right? Wrong. Texting while driving is illegal in dozens of states and while some have written their laws to allow for hands-free use of emerging voice-activated texting technologies, many others haven’t. That means it’s still illegal in some states to use Siri, typing or no typing.
‘Stateline’ breaks down the legal issues and some individual states’ laws.