If a bill filed in the Massachusetts House last week is enacted, individuals applying to drive for Uber or Lyft will be lining up to have their fingerprints taken.

“An Act Relative to Passenger Safety” (H4050) proposes regulations for transportation network companies (TNCS) like Uber and Lyft that enable people to order and pay for a ride on a smartphone. TNC drivers use their own cars.

TNCs are currently unregulated in Massachusetts, and state Rep. Michael Moran (D-Brighton)believes consumers don’t realize this. “When people in this state get into an Uber car or a Lyft car, I think they assume that someone in government has vetted that car,“ said Moran, who is sponsoring the bill along with state Sen. Linda Dorcena Forry, a Dorchester Democrat.

Although TNCs check the backgrounds of drivers they hire, the process is not open to public scrutiny, Moran said. Under his bill, the state police would forward an applicant’s fingerprints to the FBI for a check through its national criminal history database. Fingerprints are more accurate than names for searching that database, Moran said, adding that an incident in Boston last year in which a woman was abducted and raped by an Uber driver demonstrates what is at stake.

Like a proposal filed by Gov. Baker in April, the new bill would place regulation of TNCs under the Department of Public Utilities. TNCs would need a permit from the DPU to operate and would be assessed the cost of background checks and other public safety oversight. Drivers would need primary commercial auto insurance with a limit of one million dollars per person and have livery plates on the car. The vehicle could be no older than five model years. It would also require identifiable marking, Moran said, potentially protecting someone from getting in with a predator.

Hearings on the bill are scheduled for Sept.15. Opinions are likely to be divided. Moran maintains that TNCs provide the same service as taxis. And if it is the same service, he says, the public deserves the same safety protections. Taxi drivers undergo criminal background checks and scrutiny of their driving records. TNC drivers transport people for hire, but do it in private cars with private passenger plates and no special license. “That’s illegal,” Moran said. “It’s as if I parked my van down at Faneuil Hall some night and started selling beers out of the back for two dollars.”

Uber spokesman Taylor Bennett counters that TNCs present a new business model in which individuals use their private cars to bring in extra income by driving a few hours a week. “These are retirees, graduate students, and single parents that partner with Uber to use the technology,” he said. To make them get commercial drivers’ licenses and pay for livery plates and higher airport tolls would be a disincentive for drivers to sign up, potentially “costing 15,000 jobs.”

Uber now provides a million dollars per person in primary commercial insurance, starting as soon as the driver logs onto the app, Bennett said. The new bill would require a certificate of insurance in the car, as well as proof of driver screening.

Lyft spokesperson Chelsea Wilson said that the technology has inherent features that explain why consumers have felt safe with TNCs, even in the absence of government safeguards. As soon as a driver accepts a ride request, the customer receives a picture of the driver, the license number, and a description of the vehicle, and can follow the car’s approach on a map. The trip is tracked online by GPS. And Lyft provides a safety officer 24/7 whom riders can contact at any moment if they have concerns, Wilson said. The new bill would require that feature for all TNCs.

The bill also addresses marketplace fairness. “For decades, people have been stuck with a subpar way to get around,” Bennett said, calling traditional medallion taxis costly and inconvenient. “This is why taxis have lost half their business to TNCs over the past three years,” he said. “You push a button and a car shows up.”

“The old taxi business model is broken,” said Dorchester resident Donna Shaw, the staff representative of the Boston Taxi Driver’s Association and a member of the Mayor’s Taxi Advisory Committee. She said that the long-time practice of leasing to shift drivers turned the medallion into a cash cow. Fleet owners lost any incentive to modernize their business and failed to introduce smartphone apps.

But new taxi models are possible, Shaw said. One idea is a “neighborhood medallion” that the operator could lease from the city. The vehicle would be a distinctive color, be hybrid or electric, and use an app. Fares would be affordable.

Aside from a few large fleets, most taxi operators own one, two, or three cars, Moran said. They have to pay for commercial auto insurance and livery plates. They pay $5.50 at the airport tolls, versus $3 for a car with private plates. “Uber has none of these costs,” Moran said. “How can these small businesses compete with a multi-billion dollar corporation?”

He hopes the hearings will be the start of that conversation. “Rather than just put more regulations on TNCs,” Moran said, “I would really like to see the regulations on taxis be untangled so we could have more innovation.”