The European regulation requiring new cars to include an automatic crash call to 112 is eCall. The system contacts emergency services after a serious collision and transmits the vehicle’s location, time, direction of travel, and other crash data.
The European Union made eCall mandatory for new car and light-van types approved from 31 March 2018. Its purpose is to shorten the time between a crash and the arrival of medical help, particularly when occupants cannot make a phone call or do not know their location. The system can also be activated manually with an in-car button.
eCall is often confused with SOS buttons, OnStar, and Russia’s ERA-GLONASS. Those are related emergency-call services or commercial systems, but eCall is the EU initiative built around the pan-European 112 emergency number. The mandate concerns the technology installed in eligible new vehicles, not every car already on the road.
A neighbouring detail is that eCall can use satellite positioning from GPS or Galileo and send impact information from sensors such as the airbag control unit.