California Protects Black-Box Data Privacy

Snowgen writes "According to a story at SFGate.com, California has recently passed a law regulating the little black boxes found in many modern automobiles. The new law requires that manufacturers disclose the existence of such boxes in the vehicle's operators' manual. The law also prohibits the use of data from such boxes without a court order or the permission of the vehicle's owner, unless the data is used in such a way that it can not be traced back to the owner."

Comments

Re:Media

[takutai]

The recording is made in a constant 5 second loop to normal RAM. As soon as an airbag deployment event (or "near deployment" - whatever that means) occurs that 5 seconds of RAM data is copied to non-volatile write-once RAM. That is why you need to replace your SDM (Sensing Diagnostic Module) after the air bags have been deployed.

Re:Removal

[ralphus]

no, you wouldn't definately void your warranty. The Magnunson Moss warranty act (federal law) makes it illegal for manufacturers to automatically void your warranty based on modifications you make excepting that they can prove the modification you made was the cause of the failure.

see: US Code Title 15, Chapter 60, sections 2301-2312

I've been making modifications to my vehicles for years, and never had warranty claims problems on other ares of the vehicle. I've completely replaced the *entire* computer on my ducati and it's still covered. The new computer is not, but the rest of the bike that the manufacturer provided is.