Free Republic

Like other modern cars and trucks, the Genesis GV80 that Woods was driving when he crashed was equipped with an electronic data recorder... Vehicles in the Genesis line — Hyundai’s luxury brand — for example, also feature artificial intelligence software that keeps a watchful eye, sending alerts if it detects the driver is distracted or closes his or her eyes while driving. ...Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department executed a search warrant this week to retrieve the data contained on the SUV’s computers. Information on how fast Woods was going, whether he ever hit the brakes, and other clues could be...

Victims' families are closer to the truth this week: Voice and data recorders from flight AF447 have been pulled from the ocean floor, and investigators hope to unlock their contents. But experts and family members remain at odds over whether newly discovered bodies should be brought to the surface. -snip- The remains of 50 passengers were recovered and identified on the surface of the water in the days after the flight disappeared in a storm on June 1, 2009. But underwater robots recently discovered the wreck and photographed a number of bodies still fastened in their seatbelts on the Atlantic...

Some safety and privacy experts are reacting with apprehension, others with all out condemnation over a recent ruling by the National Transportation Safety Board to require electronic data recorders or "black boxes" in all new cars manufactured in the United States. "I take offense that this personal property of individuals is now being designed by the federal government," said Jim Harper, privacy attorney and editor of Privacilla.org. EDRs are certainly not new. Information gathered on black boxes — typically everything from speed, brake pressure, seat belt use and air bag deployment — has already been used in determining guilt in...

HOUSTON - In what could be one of the most significant debris discoveries yet from the shattered Columbia, searchers found a data recorder that may hold valuable clues as to what destroyed the space shuttle, the accident investigation board said Wednesday night. A spokeswoman for the board, Laura Brown, said the ship's recorder was intact but sustained some heat damage. Officials are hoping that temperature and aerodynamic pressure data can be retrieved from its magnetic tape, she said. Brown compared the recorder to an airplane's black box. "We have no way of knowing whether the data can be recovered," she...