New cars will have black boxes, White House says
All new vehicles have event data recorders, or 'black boxes', per a new mandate from the White House. The rule is raising questions over who owns the data, but black boxes in cars are really nothing new.
All new vehicles have event data recorders, or 'black boxes', per a new mandate from the White House. The rule is raising questions over who owns the data, but black boxes in cars are really nothing new.
The White House Office of Management has approved a request from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to聽mandate event data recorders, commonly referred to as 鈥渂lack boxes,鈥� in 100-percent of聽new vehicles聽sold.
In the very near future, then, the car you drive may monitor your every action behind the wheel, from speed to steering angle to brake pressure to whether or not you and your front seat passengers are buckled up.
If that makes you paranoid, this won鈥檛 help much: if you drive a newer聽car, chances are there鈥檚 already some kind of black box logging your actions, something that most consumers are blissfully unaware of. Today,聽The Detroit News聽tells us, 91.6 percent of light-duty autos utilize black boxes, so the latest directive would merely take that to 100 percent.
Black boxes in automobiles are really nothing new. General Motors began capturing data as far back as 1990, and event data recorders became standard in GM products during the 1995 model year.Ford聽uses them, as do聽Toyota,聽Tesla聽and Mazda, but standardization of the data captured won鈥檛 occur until the 2013 model year.
Beginning with 2013 vehicles, the black boxes will measure 15 specific values in a common format, making it easier for first responders and crash investigators to access and interpret the data. Therein lies the concern of critics who oppose capturing such data: if it exists, what鈥檚 to stop insurance companies from subpoenaing the information to deny accident claims?
Expect ownership of the data to become a point of concern once the new regulations take effect. While we may be safe from law enforcement wirelessly accessing data from black boxes (for the near future, anyway), we know one thing for certain: insurance companies aren鈥檛 in the business of losing money, and if such data can be used to pad profits, chances are good聽insurers will find a way to do so.聽