SCENARIO 1

On its maiden flight, a new airliner crashes shortly after takeoff with all aboard killed. The black box flight recorder indicates that both engines failed seconds after leaving the runway. Your search team recovers what remains of the engines, which is mostly just fragments of scorched and twisted metal. Some of the fragments have square dot markings punched into them. You photograph the markings with your mobile phone, then run them through the datamatrix commandline app. It shows what country the engines were made in, which factory made them, when they were manufactured, and which CNC machine did the milling. Examining the factory CNC machine you find that it had an intermittent fault, resulting in a defective engine part. The fault can then be fixed and any parts made by that machine can be recalled to prevent further accidents.

SCENARIO 2

You are in a war zone. A large enemy drone flies off course in bad weather and crashes. Even military stuff still depends on global supply chains. You find a datamatrix on a metal part of the drone wreckage and trace the country and factory where it was made. The specific factory can then be targeted for a counterattack, neutralising thousands of potential future attacks on your city. If the factory is in a friendly country then diplomatic or economic pressure could be applied to discourage them from supplying components to the enemy.

DATAMATRIX

Metal aerospace industry components usually all have datamatrix markings stamped into them. The physical dot impressions in the metal mean that the marking can withstand a high amount of heat or abrasion and still remain readable. Using these markings is often a mandatory part of the manufacturing process, so that all parts are fully traceable.

Although not as common as the more popular QR codes, datamatrix codes are everywhere if you're looking for them. They're often on product packaging, together with their corresponding GS1 codes, and they're used by delivery services and in medical applications. Sometimes they're also on paper utility bills or other official snailmail correspondence.