More Black Box info

[KenP]

From today's paper:

http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories...8755&ran=48188

Police tap into ''black boxes'' to help solve traffic crimes

By JOHN HOPKINS, The Virginian-Pilot
? August 6, 2006

The car has become a snitch, capable of spilling the beans to police about motorists' driving behavior.
Police are tapping into the so-called "black boxes" in late-model vehicles to help solve traffic crimes. In South Hampton Roads, police now have the tools and software to tap into the hidden vehicle computers for information such as drivers' speed, direction of travel and seat belt usage.
"I think everyone pretty much has it," said Richard Jensen, a police officer with Norfolk's fatality team. "The technology has been around for quite some time. We have only gotten on board in the last year."

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Master Police Officer Scott Franklin, a member of the Virginia Beach Police Department crash team, used the technology Monday in a traffic court case. Virginia Beach has been using the technology for a couple of years, said Franklin, one of eight members of the city's crash team.
The box, known as a event data recorder (EDR), often can be found in a car's transmission tunnel or under the driver's seat. The small devices came about when automakers started putting air bags in vehicles. It was intended to monitor air bag performance.

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"We download them right at the crash scene sometimes," he said. "It takes merely minutes, less than five minutes."
State Sen. John Watkins, R-Powhatan, likes the use of black boxes for police work but fears the spying eyes of others into the private data of car owners. He's the author of the state's first law regarding the boxes.
"It puts into statute, for the first time, who actually owns the data or establishes who owns the data that are collected in the black boxes and who has legal rights to it," Watkins said.

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