The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) has altered its testing policy for frontal offset crashes, allowing automakers of top-rated vehicles to submit test data to verify before the institute issues a rating. Nine vehicles for 2006, including the Buick Lucerne (pictured), Hyundai Azera, and the Toyota RAV4, have already received good ratings based on submitted data from their automakers.

The IIHS instituted the new policy based on automakers’ improvements in frontal crash protection. Note: only redesigned vehicles are eligible for this policy. The institute will still test ’substantially redesigned’ models, and will also perform audits on eligible vehicles to verify automakers’ data.

The IIHS plans to use resources freed from the new policy towards side-impact crash tests and avoidance technologies.

[Source: Associated Press via Houston Chronicle]

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