More and more cars today have safety systems designed to actively prevent crashes. Features such as blind-spot warning, lane-departure prevention and forward-collision warning alert drivers to potential hazards before an accident occurs. But these features usually are found only on higher-end cars and are designed primarily to protect the vehicle in which they’re installed.

According to Consumer Reports, an emerging low-cost technology could quickly become mainstream. Vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication is being touted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration as the next big step in vehicle safety, and the agency believes it has the potential to prevent 80 percent of crashes. It wirelessly sends safety messages to other cars on the road using embedded wireless technology and provides information on speed, direction of travel and location to help the car itself avoid accidents.

Unlike more expensive active safety systems, the technology isn’t cost-prohibitive to install and could rapidly reach all new vehicles with a deployment strategy and commitment from the auto industry and government.

NHTSA has already begun testing in-car consumer acceptance. With assistance from the University of Michigan, NHTSA will study real-world scenarios starting this summer and, after compiling all the data, determine whether there’s enough research to mandate the technology in all new cars.

But there are significant roadblocks to this utopian vision of accident-free driving. Hand-in-hand with V2V technology is vehicle-to-infrastru​cture (V2I) communication that loops in public-transportatio​n safety systems, such as traffic lights. Together, they are referred to as V2X. While V2I systems are not new -- think of red lights timed with traffic flow and the automated toll features used on roads to communicate with cars -- it will take a large public investment to make it a reality. Plus, there will be plenty of older cars without the technology still on the road.

The other hurdles are issues of privacy and security. “The concern is that once you set up a mechanism to collect data for one admittedly beneficial use, there are no intrinsic limitations on that data being collected, retained, transferred and used for other purposes,” Justin Brookman, director of the Consumer Privacy Project at the Center for Democracy & Technology, told Consumer Reports. Brookman pointed to OnStar’s recent revision of its privacy standards after a public backlash over the company’s policy of continuing to collect data -- and sell it to third parties -- even after a consumer canceled the service.

“We’re very conscious of the issues involving privacy with this system,” NHTSA deputy administrator Ron Medford told Consumer Reports, “and are going to work very hard to ensure that we’re not going to be collecting the kinds of data that’s going to violate the privacy of individuals and disclose that kind of information.” He also noted that the government is heavily focused on cybersecurity issues to ensure that vehicle data will be authenticated and that V2X systems can’t be hacked.

Once these issues are overcome, cars in the near future could be talking to each other and to the transportation infrastructure, to prevent accidents. Brian Lyons, Toyota’s manager of safety and quality communications, called it a natural evolution in automotive safety. “The first phase was about passive systems — airbags and so on,” he told Consumer Reports. “The second was about active safety, including electronic stability control, collision-avoidance systems, etc. The third phase will be about car-to-car communication that can dramatically reduce the number of crashes on our roads.”