For many parents, handing over the car keys to an inexperienced teenage driver is a modern-day rite of passage akin to the ancient practice of sending a kid out into the wilderness to face a whole new world of dangers for the first time. When a teen drives out of sight, parents can only wait, wonder and worry until they return home.

But thanks to technology, moms and dads can now electronically ride shotgun with their teens by tracking their whereabouts in real-time, monitoring their behind-the-wheel behavior with a video camera, recording whether they’re driving too fast or in a forbidden area and even limiting how loud they can crank the stereo.

While we’ll leave the issue over whether such intense scrutiny enhances or erodes parent-child trust to Dr. Phil, a study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety released in May of 2009 shows that such electronic leashes make a significant difference in causing teens to drive safer.

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