Toyota Black Box Data Is More Closed Than Others'

wjr writes "Many cars these days contain black boxes that record information (speed, accelerator position, etc) and can preserve information in the case of an accident. Ford and Chrysler say that they use 'open systems' so anyone can read out the data; General Motors has licensed Bosch to produce a device capable of reading its cars' black boxes. On the other hand, Toyota has only a single laptop in the US capable of reading its cars' black boxes, and generally won't allow the data to be read without a court order. Honda seems to have a similar policy. This is emerging as an issue in the investigation into unintended acceleration."

Comments

Dude!

[oldhack]

The Japanese are protecting our privacy!!! What are you, thick?!

Hehehe.

Re:A challenge...

[binarylarry]

Toyota's systems have over a 100 million lines of code: http://news.discovery.com/tech/toyota-recall-software-code.html

Not exactly a trivial app to just run strings on.

Uh huh

[TheSpoom]

Toyota sees only loss potentials in making an open access EDR, since more data provided in crashes means more potential liability. Therefore, they encrypt it and make it only available by court order.

Pure business (you know, excluding the human factor as usual).

Re:Uh huh

[Anonymous Coward]

You're right. And most of these accidents and screaming crisis victims are idiots who hit the wrong pedal. for the most part, attempts to show these cars are flying away out of control have failed. Yes, even with the pedal and mat recalls. Toyota screwed up in not using Japanese Denso pedals in all their cars. The US Pedal manufacturer was well outside spec. This shit happens when you make stuff in China or the USA.

And a cornered animal is a dangerous animal. Toyota is a worldwide automaker that is profitable most of the time. They can weather this, but know for long term benefit, they have to aggressively fight for US customers now. Zero % financing for 5 years takes away a ton of profit, and GM has been forced to match that offer. Unlike toyota, GM is unable to afford that kind of profit loss.

This single incident is going to add at least ten, probably far more, years to how long it will take GM to pay back her debts. Democrat regulators and congressmen who smirk as they grind Toyota for shit GM does day in day out (they had a huge recall in February too!) are being idiots. They have forced Toyota to make their cars much more affordable. Even at 9% lower sales volume last month, they will probably sell MORE cars this quarter, and GM fewer. And those cars GM sells will have far less profit.

GMAC was the primary moneymaker for GM. Toyota just took that off the table. Chrysler will probably have to match that or suffer even worse sales. There are no good reactions, except for Toyota to take a big hit now in the USA that is easily absorbed by their growth in the Eastern Hemisphere.

Oh, and I am happy with a car that some plaintiff, cop, or government bureaucrat can't take my data from. I will probably never read my black box. I don't want anyone else too. I don't even have an ugly ass toyota, but I appreciate their self interest matching my own here. What's funny is that I think Chevies are the most stylish, but am so turned off by this crisis witchhunt that I'll probably buy a Honda.

Re:Uh huh

[phantomfive]

Your analysis of the car industry might have been more convincing if it hadn't left out the biggest competitors to Toyota. Most of the lost sales from Toyota have gone to Honda or Hyundai, and Ford has beaten GM in sales recently. There is more to the auto world than just Toyota and GM.

It could be that Toyota is just being responsible

[OrwellianLurker]

Toyota ... generally won't allow the data to be read without a court order.

All it takes is a court order. So essentially the only thing slowing the investigations would be an unwilling Federal government.

Re:Let's nip this Toyota bashing in the bud

[Lehk228]

those failing tires? were made by bridgestone/firestone, a japanese company.

and the pinto?

However, a 1991 law review paper by Gary Schwartz[17] claimed the case against the Pinto was less clear-cut than commonly supposed. The number who died in Pinto rear-impact fires, according to Schwartz, was well below the hundreds cited in contemporary news reports and closer to the twenty-seven recorded by a limited National Highway Traffic Safety Administration database. Given the Pinto's production figures (over 2 million built), this was not substantially worse than typical for the time. Schwartz argued that the car was no more fire-prone than other cars of the time, that its fatality rates were lower than comparably sized imported automobiles, and that the supposed "smoking gun" document that plaintiffs claimed showed Ford's callousness in designing the Pinto was actually a document based on National Highway Traffic Safety Administration regulations about the value of a human life rather than a document containing an assessment of Ford's potential tort liability.

Re:Japanese Grammer Nazi

[93 Escort Wagon]

Not meaning to pick on the Japanese Grammar Nazi in particular, but - I can't believe we've gotten this far into the story without anyone picking up on the fact that the company president's name is TOYODA not TOYOTA (yeah I realize it's not really spelled using our alphabet). For the car company name they intentionally changed the name slightly because the T-ish symbol was considered luckier than the D-ish one.

So frankly, calling him "Toyota-san" or -dono or whatever would probably be considered a bit rude.

"voluntary" == gun to head

[Anonymous Coward]

Hah. In most cases "voluntary" means doing something with a gun to your head.
Want insurance (which you're required to have)? Better "voluntarily" open up that black box data.
Want to not be arrested? Better "voluntarily" open up that black box data.
Want to get your emissions checked? Better "voluntarily" open up that black box data.
Want to get a license for that car? Better "voluntarily" open up that black box data and let us connect it to an auto-ticketing device.

And so on....

The problem is a lot of "voluntary" things quickly become non-voluntary (i.e. forcibly waived) if you are to get standard services.

Re:A challenge...

[Dr_Barnowl]

There is some legal impetus to do this. In the states, they are following the commercial route by having insurers offer premium reductions in exchange for fitting these systems.

In the EU and the UK, they are pretending that these systems would be used to implement "road pricing" ; a sort of variable road tax which charges more for driving on roads that are heavily congested (as if that wasn't it's own penalty in the first place). If that was the real aim, you could produce a system with the same functional equivalence with mandatory RFID number plates and pickup loops on these "congested" roads... instead they want a system that can track your whereabouts everywhere, logs it to a black box, and uploads it periodically via a cellular modem, which would be at least an order of magnitude or 2 more expensive to implement and maintain. Applying the razor of Dr Occam.. road pricing is not what they really want it for.

Re:I knew that and is MAIN reason I bought Toyota

[IgnoramusMaximus]

Interesting stuff. Is there a website that details what cars have what in terms of chips and such?

Just google "T.R.E.A.D. act" and "RFID".

Here is an example of what you will find (its an article in a business rag extolling a manufacturers "success" in embedding the RFID chips and their "readiness" to help others to be complaint with the act - for a fee of course).

Ostensibly the act is intended to prevent accidents related to tires, but once you have unique RFID chips in tires that are all federally registered (which is required by the act) an inexpensive reader can be used (and or placed) anywhere by any government agency, for pretty much any purpose. Take into account recent government encroachments on freedom and privacy across the board, realize that the databases under government control can easily cross-correlate the TREAD manufacturer registry with VIN number registry and ownership records ... and it does not take multiple readings of 1984 to figure out where this is going.

That's interesting.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's interesting. Perhaps openness is related to quality... When Toyota's quality was high (back in the '90's, they used industry standard computer interfaces). Back then, Ford and GM were both pretty shoddy and they used proprietary software. Now, Toyota's quality definitely has dropped off (I saw it back in 2002 when a friend bought a new Celica and my decade older MR2 was higher quality) and they've gone proprietary. Ford and GM quality has definitely improved, and they've gone open... Hmmm. Coincedence, perhaps...

Language Barrier.....

[IHC Navistar]

I believe that Toyota's obstinence to providing such information to the concerned parties in the light of such serious safety issues is the result of a serious language barrier between Japanese and American English. Someone should provide the Japs with an accurate explaination of the following important sayings and terminology:

1) "We will screw you to the wall in a court of law",

2) "Gorilla Lawyer assrape",

3) "Pound me in the ass prison",

4) "Contempt Of Court",

5) "There is another nuke headed your way, in the form of a lawsuit",

6) "You don't have a choice",

7) "We're not in Japan",

8) "Supoena",

9) "De-listing"

and last, but certainly not least,

10) "North Korean Menace".

I believe that the clarification and explanation of the aforementioned terms would lead to the speedy resolution of the problems that are currently occurring with the Toyota Motor Corporation and it's products.

Re:A challenge...

[flowsnake]

The program is obviously written in the Whitespace Language.