"We are seeing a major emerging challenge of driver distraction, mainly by using mobile phones," Ban said. "Together we have a message to all drivers of the world: don't let using a mobile device for a few seconds make you and others immobile for life."

Ban was joined for the announcement by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, and Jennifer Smith, president of FocusDriven, a victims' advocacy organization based in the United States.

With approximately 600 million passenger cars on the road today and 4.6 billion cellphone subscriptions worldwide, drivers talking and texting behind the wheel is becoming a growing public safety threat, LaHood said. Distracted drivers are about four times as likely to be involved in a crash as those who are focused on driving, and drivers who are texting are more than 20 times more likely to crash than nondistracted drivers, research has indicated. 

Ban issued a directive to more than 40,000 U.N. staff barring them from texting behind the wheel while driving U.N.-owned vehicles. The order follows President Barack Obama's signing of an executive order last fall prohibiting nearly 4 million U.S. government employees from texting while operating government-owned vehicles or while driving other cars on official business.

The rapid increase in cellphone use around the world threatens to exacerbate an already worsening traffic fatality rate worldwide, LaHood said. Today, road crashes claim 1.3 million lives each year, the equivalent of one death every 30 seconds. By 2030, the World Health Organization projects that traffic crashes will climb from the ninth to the fifth leading cause of death worldwide. The vast majority of road crashes result from preventable driver behavior. 

The State Department has asked U.S. embassies around the world to raise awareness about distracted driving as well as to collect data about distracted driving from other governments.

"Texting while driving isn't a harmless little habit. It’s a killer," Rice said. "It affects every nation on Earth. The suffering it causes is terribly direct and immediate -- lives lost for no reason, futures shattered in an instant. But its toll is truly global. So this is a problem that needs global attention and action."

Many other governments are also moving to put an end to distracted driving. To date, 32 countries have passed laws that restrict drivers' use of handheld devices. Portugal has outlawed all phone use -- hand-held or hands-free -- in the driver's seat.

"Distracted driving is one of the major risk factors for road traffic crashes," Churkin said. "It was highlighted during the First Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety held in Moscow last November. ... Russia is ready to engage with the United States and other interested countries in defining the ways to mainstream it into global road safety cooperation agenda."

The global effort to prevent distracted driving also has an active online component that will allow other countries, safety organizations, and anti-distraction campaigns to share news and research as well as multimedia and other information. Facebook users can find out more about the campaign as well as other anti-distraction groups and events by visiting www.facebook.com/gcedd, the Global Call to End Distracted Driving page. U.S. DOT also hosts an official U.S. government website to devoted anti-distraction news and information at www.distraction.gov.