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Since May 1, 2022, all new cars circulating in Europe must be equipped with a black box. A device that records driving parameters a few seconds before an accident, such as speed, acceleration or braking phase, or seat belt wearing.
black boxes in cars “do not record any personal data, only data concerning the behavior of the vehicle”, explained Tuesday, May 3 on franceinfo Anne Lavaud, general delegate of the Prévention Routière association. Since May 1, new cars must be equipped with a black box.
franceinfo: What data is stored in these black boxes?
Anne Lavaud: These are the data recorded by the vehicle itself, that is to say the speed, the inclination of the vehicle, the braking and all that is activation of the driving aids which are frequent on vehicles.
Does this mean that we will no longer have any indications in the event of an accident?
This is no doubt what manufacturers are hoping for with this type of black box. They hope to be able to recover 40 seconds of data, ie 30 seconds before the shock and 10 seconds after. So every 40 seconds the recorded data is overwritten. It is clear that this does not record any personal data, only data concerning the behavior of the vehicle.
Who is this data intended for?
To judicial authorities, investigation offices and all research institutes working on road safety, including manufacturers’ research institutes. For an association like ours, these 30 seconds preceding the accident are not enough and since we have no context, we do not know where the vehicle was traveling, in what weather conditions, on what type of road, and what was the behavior of the driver. If we had GPS data we would know what type of network he was traveling on. As we do not have this data, for us this information will be useless.
Do you think this device will help reduce the number of accidents?
I don’t think so, but maybe it will allow manufacturers to improve everything related to safety inside the cabin or driving aids.