Dash cams: Small video cameras that film the road ahead are being used by motorists to help keep them out of trouble and avoid bogus insurance claims

THE idea of fitting a car with a video camera only struck many motorists as a good idea in February 2013. That was when a meteor streaked over Chelyabinsk in Russia before exploding, injuring more than 1,000 people and damaging thousands of buildings. Soon after, videos of the giant fire ball began to appear online—which in an age of ubiquitous smartphones is, perhaps, not surprising. But what was rather unusual is that a dozen or so were filmed by small cameras mounted on the dashboards of cars—dash cams, as they are called. Such devices are growing in popularity as increasingly sophisticated cameras come to market. But why would motorists want them and what do they do?

The reason so many Russian drivers use dash cams is lax and sometimes corrupt law enforcement. They have become an essential accessory in a country with a high number of traffic accidents and uncertain resolution in apportioning blame. Indeed, thousands of Russian videos of horrific crashes, remarkable near misses and blatant attempts at insurance fraud by drivers and pedestrians have become a staple on YouTube and other websites. The cameras are also popular in China and are now being promoted more widely in Europe and America.

The ready availability of inexpensive digital-camera technology and flash-memory cards, some based on small “action” cameras used by sportsmen, led a number of relatively unknown Chinese, Taiwanese and South Korean producers into the dash-cam market. But now big consumer brands have started making them too, including America’s Hewlett-Packard, Japan’s Panasonic and Garmin, a large Swiss-based manufacturer of GPS-based products.

Cyclists and motorcyclists were among the first to use small cameras to film their ride and to collect evidence of clashes with motorists. Police and drivers of commercial vehicles also employ them. Many newer dash cams are engineered specifically for cars and range in price from less than $100 to $300 and more. They usually attach to the windscreen with a suction cup, like a portable sat nav. Although most contain a small battery for a short period of operation, dash cams need to be powered by a lead plugged into the vehicle’s power socket. Turning the ignition on and off automatically starts and stops the recording. They can also be wired into the vehicle’s electronics.

Most companies produce a range of dash cams with the more expensive ones offering additional features, such as high-definition recording. Some have built-in GPS chips, which on playback can plot the vehicle’s route on a map. This might prove a mixed blessing: the GPS chip can also calculate and record speed, which could be incriminating. Many insurance companies will accept video as evidence in a claim, but rules vary around the world—dash cams are illegal for privacy reasons in Austria, for instance.

Nextbase, a British company, produces a dash cam called the 402G with GPS. A screen on the device is a useful way to check the camera is working and to change settings. The screen can be timed to go off after a few seconds to avoid distracting the driver and, once installed, the device can largely be forgotten about. Like other dash cams it constantly records segments of video with sound and stores them on a memory card, operating in a “loop”. Once the capacity of the card is full, it overwrites older segments. Dash cams typically have a sensor which prevents the latest video from being erased after a jolt from a crash.

Dash cams come in various styles. Mio, a Taiwanese company, makes one that works through a rear-view mirror. BlackVue, a South Korean firm, produces a combined forward and rear-view camera. The GPS-equipped nüviCam from Garmin also uses the camera to alert drivers, if, say, they are drifting out of the lanes on a motorway or getting too close to the vehicle in front.

Kirsty Quartley, a Garmin product manager, says one reason drivers buy dash cams is to protect themselves not just in the event of a disputed accident claim but also from faked crashes. This includes so-called “flash-for-cash” scams: a driver flashes their headlights to invite someone to pull out in front of them at a junction, but then deliberately drives into the other vehicle—the driver of which is then promptly blamed for failing to stop. This usually results in an inflated claim for “whiplash” injuries.

A standard feature

In time dash cams could be included as optional or even standard equipment in cars, much as sat navs are now. Reversing cameras will be mandatory in new cars in America after May 2018, and an increasing number of new vehicles are being fitted with side-view cameras that help drivers see around blind junctions when pulling out. So, adding a relatively low-cost forward-facing camera and combining it with a recording function—even one that monitors the car’s other cameras—would not be difficult.

Carmakers may already be moving in that direction. General Motor’s new Corvette Stingray has a dash cam fitted as part of a system that logs its performance. Dash cams might one day be connected to event data recorders (EDRs), which are already fitted to most new vehicles. Originally intended to monitor the deployment of airbags, EDRs can record vehicle information, such as speed and braking, in the final seconds leading up to a crash. They have been used by police as evidence in prosecutions.

Some safety authorities have proposed using EDRs as part of a “black box” system in cars, much like that in aircraft. Equipped with video, such a system would provide useful detail for crash investigators. As cars become autonomous, such systems may well be needed to help apportion blame—not just to drivers but also to the cars themselves.