Security through networking—or the perfect excuse to let infrastructure continue to decay?

17/02/2026 /

On January 21, 2026, Germany’s bicycle industry association ZIV announced it had joined the Coalition for Cyclist Safety (C4CS). Officially, the goal is simple: improve safety for cyclists and other vulnerable road users. Sounds unarguable.

Published by Radical Life Studios / MTB Report

C4CS frames this as a V2X mission: a connected ecosystem where “cars can digitally see bikes” and “bikes can digitally see cars”—warnings, earlier detection, fewer collisions. The coalition launched on October 23, 2023, explicitly as a “deployment” initiative, not a think-tank.

And here’s the honest part: this can either be real progress—or the most convenient excuse to avoid doing the hard work.

The responsibility shift: from the car to the bike

Traffic safety isn’t symmetrical. A bicycle is light and fragile. A car or truck is heavy and dangerous. So if we start telling the story in a way that implies the bike must become “smart” to be safe, we flip the logic on its head.

Because modern cars already have the tools to detect cyclists. Euro NCAP has been testing AEB systems for cyclist scenarios for years—crossing cyclists, cyclists emerging from behind parked cars, and more.
On top of that, EU vehicle safety policy has been pushing the wider rollout of safety systems in new vehicles—explicitly with vulnerable road users in mind.

So the uncomfortable question is not “can cars do it?”
It’s why we’re talking as if bikes need to carry the burden when the heaviest vehicles already have sensors, computing power, and (in many cases) software update pathways.

And yes—this matters politically. Because the moment connected bike tech becomes the new narrative, you can already see the next step: “Well, if you weren’t connected, that’s on you.”
That’s how safety turns from a public standard into a private upgrade.

Bikes get more expensive—and safety becomes a budget question

Putting V2X on bikes isn’t free. Hardware, power supply, security certificates, updates, integration—often wrapped in app logic. In practice, this rolls out first where money already flows: premium bikes, e-bikes, “connected” accessories.

Result: more safety for people who can afford it. Everyone else rides the same intersection, with the same risks, just without the digital layer.

That’s not a small detail. That’s a values question:
Is road safety a feature—or a public responsibility?

Tracking: the real risk is the ecosystem, not the idea

V2X has known privacy risks for a long time. That’s why European ITS approaches include mechanisms like changing pseudonym certificates to reduce persistent identification and tracking.

But let’s be brutally realistic: the biggest tracking risk usually doesn’t come from “someone listening to radio signals.” It comes from everything around it—accounts, apps, cloud services, analytics, subscriptions, telemetry. Once “safety” is tied to a platform, control shifts away from the rider.

If we accept a world where you must trade your freedom of movement for an account or a data pipeline, then we didn’t build safety—we built a leash.

So the line should be clear:
If V2X, then privacy by default, no account requirement, a real off-switch, and data minimization that can be verified.

Environment: smaller than a battery, but still real

No, a V2X module isn’t a 700-Wh battery. But it’s still additional electronics—materials, manufacturing, transport, and eventually waste. The real question isn’t “how many grams?” It’s how long the system stays supported.

How many years of updates?
Modular and repairable—or sealed and disposable?
What happens when the app company disappears?

If those answers are missing, “safety” becomes a shiny label on top of future e-waste.

And the big one: infrastructure doesn’t improve because data flows

Most crash hotspots are already known—and yet infrastructure is often outdated. That’s the heart of it: bikes have evolved massively; infrastructure hasn’t kept up.

The danger with “smart safety” is that it invites lazy governance: optimize a few hotspots, declare progress, and let the rest degrade. And when conflicts remain, the next move is often not rebuilding—it’s restrictions: bans, rerouting, rules that push cyclists out of the way instead of protecting them properly.

That would be the worst outcome: we don’t make roads safer—we make them more monitored and more regulated.

Bottom line: connected safety can help, but it must not become the new requirement

V2X can absolutely be a helpful extra layer in turning scenarios and at obstructed intersections. But it must never become the baseline expectation that bikes must upgrade so cars will take them seriously.

If modern vehicles already detect cyclists via onboard sensors—and Euro NCAP and EU policy are pushing exactly that direction—then the logical priority is obvious:

Improve the software and standards in cars, modernize infrastructure—and keep V2X on bikes optional, not mandatory.