Hackers, Forklifts, and Other Things Manufacturers Blame on Repair

When lawmakers consider Right to Repair, manufacturers and their trade groups usually show up with the same script.

They support repair, of course.

They support consumer choice, naturally.

They support small businesses, safety, sustainability, affordability, resilience, and probably puppies.

They just oppose the actual law that would make repair possible.

That script is on full display in Alaska, where HB 162 would give Alaskans more practical access to the parts, tools, and information needed to fix the products they own. And the opposition testimony has been revealing. Not because the arguments are new, but because they are so familiar, so exaggerated, and so openly hostile to the basic idea that anyone outside a manufacturer-controlled network can be trusted to repair anything.

The message from industry is clear: repair is fine, as long as manufacturers get to decide who repairs, what gets repaired, when repair happens, and how much control they keep after the sale.

That is not repair freedom. That is a service monopoly with better lighting.

The Fear Campaign Has Arrived

The Consumer Technology Association (CTA) warned Alaska lawmakers about a “patchwork” of state repair laws and said it supports a “national repair approach,” including a national Memorandum of Understanding. Translation: do not pass an enforceable state law; wait for a voluntary deal designed by the same industry that has spent years fighting repair laws. 

That argument sounds reasonable until you remember how Right to Repair has actually moved in the United States. States have led. States passed the laws. States forced the issue. States created the pressure that finally dragged manufacturers toward repair access after years of resistance.

The opposition wants Alaska to wait for a national solution because delay is the product.

A voluntary national agreement is not a right. It is a permission slip. And permission slips can be rewritten, narrowed, delayed, or revoked.

Apparently, Repair Documentation Is Now a Cybersecurity Threat

The Truck and Engine Manufacturers Association went further. It warned that broader access to service information would create “enormous cybersecurity risks” and make it easier for hackers to tamper with equipment.  

This is the old move: take an ordinary repair issue and inflate it until it sounds like a cyberattack.

Need a manual? Cyber risk.

Need an error code? Cyber risk.

Need a diagnostic tool? Cyber risk.

Want to replace a broken part without waiting weeks for manufacturer-controlled service? Congratulations, you are now starring in an infrastructure thriller written by lobbyists.

No one seriously argues that every tool should be handed out with no safeguards. But that is not what Right to Repair requires. Repair access is not source code. Repair is not hacking. Repair is not modification. Repair is not emissions tampering. Repair is the ordinary act of restoring a product to working condition.

If manufacturers believe a specific tool, system, or procedure creates a specific risk, they should identify it and make that case directly. What they should not get to do is use the word “cybersecurity” as a magic spell to shut down repair.

They Don’t Trust the Public

The most revealing line came from EMA, which argued that “untrained individuals and the public” having access to service information is “dangerous and unnecessary.”

There it is.

Not just unsafe modification. Not just emissions systems. Not just critical infrastructure. The public.

This is the part manufacturers usually try to soften. They say they support owners. They say they support independent repair. They say they only care about safety. But again and again, the mask slips.

The real argument is that people cannot be trusted with information about the products they own.

That should bother every lawmaker.

Because repair information is not dangerous by default. Independent repair businesses are not dangerous by default. Owners are not dangerous by default. What is dangerous is a market where a manufacturer can sell you a product and then decide, years later, that you do not deserve the tools or information needed to keep it working.

The Forklift Horror Story

The Papé Group offered one of the more cinematic warnings, asking lawmakers to imagine “an untrained technician resetting the load parameters of a forklift” operating more than 30 feet in the air, where a mistake could have “fatal consequences.”

That sounds scary because it is supposed to.

But it also shows how these debates get distorted. Instead of discussing ordinary repair access, opponents jump straight to the most dramatic hypothetical they can find. A battery replacement becomes emissions tampering. A diagnostic code becomes hacking. A repair manual becomes a death-by-forklift scenario.

This is not how serious policy should be made.

If a specific category of equipment needs a specific exemption, lawmakers can debate that. If a specific repair procedure requires certification, training, or safeguards, lawmakers can address that too. But disaster hypotheticals should not become a veto over repair rights for everyone else.

The question should be simple: what exact repair access is being requested, what exact risk is being claimed, and what exact safeguard would solve it?

If the answer is “just let manufacturers keep control,” that is not a safety policy. It’s a tried and true business model.

Repair Is Not Tampering

Several opponents tried to blur the line between repair and tampering. Marine and engine manufacturers warned about Clean Air Act compliance, emissions systems, and software access that could enable noncompliance.

But repair and illegal modification are not the same thing.

Replacing a failed part is not defeating emissions controls. Reading an error code is not pollution. Fixing equipment so it operates as designed is not the same as modifying it to operate outside the law.

This conflation is deliberate. “Repair” is popular. “Tampering” is not. So opponents try to staple the two together and hope lawmakers do not notice.

They should notice.

Right to Repair laws can preserve limits on unlawful modification while still requiring access to the materials needed for lawful diagnosis, maintenance, and repair. That distinction is not complicated. It is inconvenient.

“Trust Us” Is Not a Consumer Protection Policy

Some opponents pointed to private agreements, manufacturer programs, and industry-run complaint processes as proof that legislation is unnecessary. The Alaska Farm Bureau argued that private-sector MOUs with agricultural equipment manufacturers should be allowed to prove themselves and serve as a model. 

Voluntary programs can help. The folks at iFixit work with manufacturers on voluntary repair programs every day.

But voluntary access is not a substitute for enforceable rights.

A manufacturer program can be useful and still inadequate. It can expand access today and restrict it tomorrow. It can work for one category and fail in another. It can serve the customers a manufacturer wants to serve while leaving everyone else with no remedy.

That is the problem Right to Repair laws are trying to solve.

Consumers should not have to hope a manufacturer’s voluntary program covers them. Independent repair shops should not have to build their businesses on access that can disappear. And citizens from Alaska to Maine should not be told that the solution to repair barriers is to file a complaint with the same industry ecosystem that created the barriers in the first place.

Alaska Is Exactly Why Repair Rights Matter

Opponents also argued that Alaska’s geography makes repair hard, and that Right to Repair will not magically solve the logistics of parts, technicians, and distance.

That’s true.

Right to Repair will not shrink Alaska. It will not teleport parts to remote communities. It will not create trained technicians overnight.

But that is not an argument against repair access. It is an argument for it.

When distance is already a barrier, manufacturer restrictions make everything worse. When shipping is slow, local diagnosis matters more. When authorized service is far away, independent repair matters more. When replacing a product is expensive or wasteful, keeping the old one working matters more.

Alaska’s geography is not a reason to deny repair rights. It is one of the best reasons to pass them.

This Is a Control Argument Wearing a Hard Hat

The opposition to fair repair laws is not really about safety. Safety matters, and repair laws can account for it.

It is not really about cybersecurity. Security matters, and repair laws can account for it.

It is not really about emissions compliance. Environmental law matters, and repair laws can account for it.

The real fight is over control.

Manufacturers want to control the repair channel after the sale. They want to decide who gets parts, who gets tools, who gets diagnostic access, and who gets to compete. And when lawmakers challenge that control, the same industries suddenly discover a parade of terrifying hypotheticals.

Hackers.

Tampering.

Unsafe repairs.

Fatal forklifts.

Pollution.

Lawsuits.

Patchwork.

Chaos.

It is the same scare campaign, updated for whatever product category is in front of the committee that day.

Lawmakers Should Not Fall for It

Lawmakers should take real safety concerns seriously. They should scrutinize the bill. They should draw clear lines where needed. They should reject sloppy drafting and demand specificity from everyone.

But they should also recognize the opposition campaign for what it is.

When industry groups say they support repair but oppose the law, ask what enforceable rights they support.

When they say repair access is dangerous, ask whether they provide the same access to their own authorized networks.

When they warn about modification, ask why they are conflating it with repair.

When they invoke cybersecurity, ask for the specific vulnerability.

When they ask residents to wait for a national solution, ask who benefits from waiting.

Because the answer is usually the same: the companies that already control repair.

Right to Repair laws are not radical. It is a basic statement that ownership should mean something. If a product can be repaired safely within a manufacturer’s chosen network, then repair should not become impossible the moment an owner or independent shop asks for the same practical access.