Recently, the Dutch road transport inspection halted twelve trucks from Latvia for a routine inspection. The Dutch didn’t trust what they saw, and asked for help from a Scania workshop nearby, west of Amsterdam. The twelve trucks were taken off the road.
After a lengthy investigation, the mechanics and inspectors found a small box behind the drivers seat which gives signals to the digital tachograph blocking out the speed signals from the gearbox as well as the second speed signal which is mandatory nowadays. When the driver operates the little box, the tacho equipment thinks that the truck is standing still, while it is actually on the way.
The mechanics discovered a connection from the box underneath the floor mat. They followed the lead right into the fusebox, where they found taped wires indicating manipulation. Also, after more investigation, they found a replaced chip to make sure that the tachograph would only receive signals from the little box. Especially this replaced chip was very hard to discover.
To activate the small box, the driver has to follow a special starting procedure. A small LED light indicates that the box blacks out the actual signal from the driveline and that the box itself supplies the tachograph with false information.
Scania and the Dutch inspectors comment that this type of fraud is highly sophisticated, and done by professionals. They noted that three trucks had the system, seven were already prepared for this system and only one truck was OK. Scania has warned all it’s workshops about this fraud and the Dutch Inspection meanwhile has the right equipment to detect this fraud.