A data recorder is a logging device used to record the history and activity of starships and small craft. In 2368, Jean-Luc Picard was able to access the data recorder of a crashed shuttlepod, information retrieved allowed him to access a chamber in the ziggurat the shuttlepod had crash-landed into. (TNG comic: "Captain's Pleasure") In 2372, the USS Enterprise-E managed to recover the USS Samson's badly damaged data recorder, following the ship's destruction in the Pantera Nebula. (TNG eBook: A Sea of Troubles)