Kentucky Just Banned Something Almost Nobody Has Documented
A new Kentucky law bars manufacturers from restricting software installation on rebuilt-title vehicles. It appears to be the first of its kind. It also targets the one practice in this area that is hardest to find evidence for, while the practices that are well documented go untouched.
Last verified 4 August 2026. Statutory text read directly from the Kentucky Legislative Research Commission.
What the law says
Effective 15 July 2026, KRS 186A.530(11) reads, in full:
"A manufacturer licensed under KRS Chapter 190 shall not prohibit or restrict the installation of vehicle software on a vehicle that has been issued a rebuilt title under this section."
That is the entire provision. One sentence.
It arrived as a House Committee Substitute to Senate Bill 110, passed the House 76, 13 and the Senate 35, 1, and was signed on 13 April 2026 as Acts chapter 135. Public description of SB 110: the Senate majority's own release, and the state dealer association's trade coverage, presented it as electronic-titling modernization. Neither mentioned the software provision.
Why it is structurally strange
Two bodies of law could plausibly govern whether a manufacturer may lock software on a wrecked-and-rebuilt car. Neither one does.
Title-branding law: the statutes that decide when a car gets a salvage or rebuilt title: is titling, VIN verification, anti-theft and disclosure law. Across the 51 US jurisdictions, it does not mention manufacturers or software.
Right-to-repair law does reach manufacturer software, but only two states have an automotive one in force. Massachusetts (G.L. c. 93K, as amended by the 2020 ballot question) and Maine (29-A M.R.S. § 1810, from the 2023 ballot question). Neither contains the words salvage, rebuilt, reconstructed, or branded anywhere.
Every other state's right-to-repair statute is general electronics law that expressly excludes motor vehicles. Colorado: "this part 15 does not apply to … a person acting in the person's official capacity as a motor vehicle manufacturer." New York, Minnesota and Washington carry near-identical carve-outs.
So the two silos never touch. Title law does not mention software; software law does not mention titles. Kentucky is the first bridge we could find between them.
A limit on that claim, stated plainly: a dedicated search covering Massachusetts, Maine, Colorado, New York, Texas, California, Florida, Illinois, Washington, Minnesota, New Jersey and Arizona found nothing comparable, and a phrase search for the operative language returned no matches in any state code. That is twelve states checked, not fifty. We had earlier described this provision as unique across all 51 jurisdictions; that was an overclaim, because our 51-state survey was looking for repair-cost thresholds and never searched for software provisions at all. A negative is only as wide as the question that produced it.
The problem: the statute names the least-documented practice
Here the story stops being tidy.
The best-documented manufacturer restriction on branded-title vehicles is Tesla's, and it is published. Tech Note TN-18-00-001 R5, "Unsupported Vehicle Policy," dated 17 July 2025, defines an unsupported vehicle to include one that:
"• Has been declared a total loss … • Has been registered and/or titled by its owner as a salvaged-titled vehicle. • Has been rebuilt-titled or junk-titled (or its equivalent, pursuant to local jurisdiction or industry practice)."
The consequences Tesla states are specific: fast charging is disabled, including third-party networks; Tesla will not perform or support repairs involving the high-voltage battery system; warranties are affected. Tesla also warns against working around it: "If a vehicle is found to have been modified to enable fast charging, Tesla may disable fast charging, take legal action, and seek compensation."
That policy uses the word "software" zero times. It says nothing about over-the-air updates, module programming, ADAS calibration, or telematics. It affirmatively says the opposite of a lockout on two points: "Parts availability is not affected. Any Unrestricted or Over-the-Counter part may be purchased for an unsupported vehicle," and "Usage of the mobile application remains supported for unsupported vehicles."
So the documented practice is charging denial, high-voltage service refusal, and warranty voiding. The Kentucky statute prohibits restricting software installation. Those are not the same thing, and on the current public record the thing the statute names is the part hardest to evidence.
What is asserted but not documented
Claims that other manufacturers block software or updates on branded-title cars are common in the trade and thin on sourcing:
- GM allegedly declining support for branded-title vehicles beyond legally required emissions calibrations, traced to a post on a professional technician forum. No GM document located.
- Lucid allegedly imposing a mandatory re-shell, a speed lock, and a permanent OTA ban, traced to a YouTube video, then summarized by aggregator outlets. No Lucid policy document located.
- Rivian service-software refusals, owner forums only.
There is also no litigation, no FTC action, and no state attorney general action on title-brand-triggered software restriction that we could locate. And nothing at all for Ford, Stellantis or Toyota.
One contrary data point worth carrying: when CBS News Chicago reported on a Tesla supercharging ban in October 2025, it noted that it contacted other EV makers and charging networks, and "the companies we heard back from said they do not" have similar policies. That same story is worth reading for a different reason, the Illinois Secretary of State Police investigated and confirmed the car in question had a clean title and never had a salvage title.
The conflation to avoid
This one matters for anyone writing or arguing about it.
A module harvested from a salvage vehicle carries the donor's VIN and generally needs manufacturer tooling (Ford PMI, GM SPS), to be re-flashed to the recipient car. That is a real, well-documented, everyday problem.
A recipient vehicle whose own title is branded is a completely different question. That is about the car's paperwork, not the part's history.
These get merged constantly. Merging them produces an argument that sounds strong and is actually about something else.
The manufacturers' side, stated fairly
There is a genuine OEM position here, and it deserves to be represented properly rather than strawmanned. Two things are worth knowing about it.
First, the arguments do not connect. Full-text review of three major Alliance for Automotive Innovation filings (the 2020 Massachusetts complaint, the 2024 DMCA § 1201 opposition, and the 2024 post-hearing letter), plus a January 2026 congressional coalition letter, found zero references to salvage, totaled, rebuilt, branded-title or flood vehicles. The industry's software and telematics arguments are about cybersecurity and data access. Its salvage arguments are about parts and structural integrity. In the public record, the two never meet.
Second, the salvage arguments are real and about parts, not paperwork.
General Motors, ADAS position statement dated 20 July 2026, the closest any OEM comes to linking salvage history to calibration:
"The use of salvaged, recycled, reconditioned, remanufactured, aftermarket, or any secondary-market ADAS radars, cameras, sensors, or related components is not approved and strictly prohibited by GM … any of which can compromise ADAS system reliability, calibration accuracy, and, in certain instances, vehicle safety performance."
Ford, on sectioning two vehicles: "Parts removed from another vehicle may have unseen stress cracks, corrosion or fatigue damage." FCA: differences between salvage and new components "can only be determined through destructive testing," and "salvage components are not traceable should a component recall be required."
Note what those say. They restrict parts sourced from salvage. None conditions anything on the recipient vehicle's title brand.
On software specifically, the industry's threat model is about remote command access, not the diagnostic port. From the Alliance's 2020 complaint: "A sophisticated hacker could even install software with delayed activation, such as disabling the brake system one month after repair is performed." NHTSA has echoed the concern about remote bidirectional channels.
And the line that cuts back. In the GAO report the Alliance itself submitted as a supporting exhibit, NHTSA is quoted saying: "cybersecurity should not be a reason to justify limiting who can conduct repairs and, conversely, the ability to make repairs should not limit cybersecurity controls." The same report records that all eight automakers interviewed said they could provide necessary telematics access through their own closed systems.
Tesla's own stated rationale is narrower and more defensible than its critics usually allow: it will not support high-voltage work "Until Tesla can confirm that an unsupported vehicle meets Tesla's safety standards and vehicle specifications," citing risk to the driver, to technicians, and to Supercharger equipment.
What this means if you run a shop
In Kentucky, from 15 July 2026, you have a statutory hook you did not have before if a manufacturer refuses to let software be installed on a rebuilt-title car. It is one sentence with no stated enforcement mechanism, no penalty, and no agency assigned, so how it actually bites is untested.
Everywhere else, nothing has changed. If you are outside Massachusetts or Maine, your state's right-to-repair law, if it has one, almost certainly excludes vehicles outright.
For any branded-title EV, the live issues on the record are charging access, high-voltage service, and warranty status, not software installation. Those are the questions to ask before you take the job, and the answers should go to the customer in writing before you start.
Document what you actually hit. The evidentiary record here is thin in a way that surprised us. If a manufacturer refuses something because of a title brand, the refusal in writing is worth more than any anecdote; it is the kind of primary document that is currently missing from this entire debate.
What we do not know
- Whether any of the 38 states we did not search has a comparable provision.
- Whether the Kentucky provision has been used, and what happens when it is.
- Whether any manufacturer other than Tesla has a written salvage-title software policy. GM and Lucid are the two best candidates and both currently rest on sources we would not publish from.
- The current status of the federal REPAIR Act (H.R. 1566). It had not been enacted as of early August 2026 and bill status changes; check before relying on it.
How we verified this. KRS 186A.530 and 186A.520 were read directly from the Kentucky Legislative Research Commission at their operative 15 July 2026 versions. Bill history came from LRC records for 2026 SB 110. Tesla policy language is quoted from Tesla-hosted service documents. OEM position statements are quoted from manufacturer-published sources. Where a claim rests on trade press or a forum, we say so. Where we could not reach a source, we say that too.
Found something wrong here? We would rather correct it than defend it, contact@theautobodydirectory.com.
General consumer information: not legal, insurance, or financial advice. Requirements, coverage, and practices vary by state, policy, and manufacturer.