title: SD card

text: In early 2010, commercial SDXC cards appeared from Toshiba (64 GB), Panasonic (64 GB and 48 GB), and SanDisk (64 GB).


title: SD card

text: In early 2011, Centon Electronics, Inc. (64 GB and 128 GB) and Lexar (128 GB) began shipping SDXC cards rated at Speed Class 10. Pretec offered cards from 8 GB to 128 GB rated at Speed Class 16. In September 2011, SanDisk released a 64 GB microSDXC card. Kingmax released a comparable product in 2011.


title: SD card

text: In April 2012, Panasonic introduced MicroP2 card format for professional video applications. The cards are essentially full-size SDHC or SDXC UHS-II cards, rated at UHS Speed Class U1. An adapter allows MicroP2 cards to work in current P2 card equipment.


title: SD card

text: Panasonic MicroP2 cards shipped in March 2013 and were the first UHS-II compliant products on market; initial offer includes a 32GB SDHC card and a 64GB SDXC card. Later that year, Lexar released the first 256 GB SDXC card, based on 20 nm NAND flash technology.


title: SD card

text: In February 2014, SanDisk introduced the first 128 GB microSDXC card, which was followed by a 200 GB microSDXC card in March 2015. September 2014 saw SanDisk announce the first 512 GB SDXC card.


title: SD card

text: Samsung announced the world's first EVO Plus 256 GB microSDXC card in May 2016, and in September 2016 Western Digital (SanDisk) announced that a prototype of the first 1 TB SDXC card would be demonstrated at Photokina.


title: SD card

text: In January 2018, Integral Memory unveiled its 512 GB microSDXC card. In May 2018, PNY launched a 512 GB microSDXC card. In June 2018 Kingston announced its Canvas series of MicroSD cards which were capable of capacities up to 512 GB, in three variations, Select, Go!, and React.


title: SD card

text: The Secure Digital Ultra Capacity (SDUC) format supports cards up to 128 TB and offers speeds up to 985 MB/s.


title: SD card

text: Secure Digital includes five card families available in three sizes. The five families are the original Standard-Capacity (SDSC), the High-Capacity (SDHC), the eXtended-Capacity (SDXC), the Ultra-Capacity (SDUC) and the SDIO, which combines input/output functions with data storage. The three form factors are the original size, the mini size, and the micro size. Electrically passive adapters allow a smaller card to fit and function in a device built for a larger card. The SD card's small footprint is an ideal storage medium for smaller, thinner, and more portable electronic devices.


title: SD card

text: The second-generation Secure Digital (SDSC or Secure Digital Standard Capacity) card was developed to improve on the MultiMediaCard (MMC) standard, which continued to evolve, but in a different direction. Secure Digital changed the MMC design in several ways:


title: SD card

text: Full-size SD cards do not fit into the slimmer MMC slots, and other issues also affect the ability to use one format in a host device designed for the other.


title: SD card

text: The Secure Digital High Capacity (SDHC) format, announced in January 2006 and defined in version 2.0 of the SD specification, supports cards with capacities up to 32 GB. The SDHC trademark is licensed to ensure compatibility.


title: SD card

text: SDHC cards are physically and electrically identical to standard-capacity SD cards (SDSC). The major compatibility issues between SDHC and SDSC cards are the redefinition of the Card-Specific Data (CSD) register in version 2.0 (see below), and the fact that SDHC cards are shipped preformatted with the FAT32 file system.


title: SD card

text: Version 2.0 also introduces a High-speed bus mode for both SDSC and SDHC cards, which doubles the original Standard Speed clock to produce 25 MB/s.


title: SD card

text: SDHC host devices are required to accept older SD cards. However, older host devices do not recognize SDHC or SDXC memory cards, although some devices can do so through a firmware upgrade. Older Windows operating systems released before Windows 7 require patches or service packs to support access to SDHC cards.


title: SD card

text: The Secure Digital eXtended Capacity (SDXC) format, announced in January 2009 and defined in version 3.01 of the SD specification, supports cards up to 2 TB, compared to a limit of 32 GB for SDHC cards in the SD 2.0 specification. SDXC adopts Microsoft's exFAT file system as a mandatory feature.


title: SD card

text: Version 3.01 also introduced the Ultra High Speed (UHS) bus for both SDHC and SDXC cards, with interface speeds from 50 MB/s to 104 MB/s for four-bit UHS-I bus. (this number has since been exceeded with SanDisk proprietary technology for 170 MB/s read, which is not proprietary anymore, as Lexar has the 1066x running at 160 MB/s read and 120 MB/s write via UHS 1, and Kingston also has their Canvas Go! Plus, also running at 170 MB/s).


title: SD card

text: Version 4.0, introduced in June 2011, allows speeds of 156 MB/s to 312 MB/s over the four-lane (two differential lanes) UHS-II bus, which requires an additional row of physical pins.


title: SD card

text: Version 5.0 was announced in February 2016 at CP+ 2016, and added "Video Speed Class" ratings for UHS cards to handle higher resolution video formats like 8K. The new ratings define a minimal write speed of 90 MB/s.


title: SD card

text: The Secure Digital Ultra Capacity (SDUC) format, described in the SD 7.0 specification, and announced in June 2018, supports cards up to 128 TB and offers speeds up to 985 MB/s, regardless of form factor, either micro or full size, or interface type including UHS-I, UHS-II, UHS-III or SD Express. The SD Express interface can also be used with SDHC and SDXC cards.


title: SD card

text: SDXC and SDUC cards are normally formatted using the exFAT file system, thereby limiting their use to a limited set of operating systems. Therefore, exFAT-formatted SDXC cards are not a 100% universally readable exchange medium.


title: SD card

text: Windows Vista (SP1) and later and OS X (10.6.5 and later) have native support for exFAT. (Windows XP and Server 2003 can support exFAT via an optional update from Microsoft.)


title: SD card

text: Most BSD and Linux distributions did not, for legal reasons; though in Linux kernel 5.4 Microsoft open-sourced the spec and allowed the inclusion of an exFAT driver. Users of older kernels or BSD can manually install third-party implementations of exFAT (as a FUSE module) in order to be able to mount exFAT-formatted volumes. However, SDXC cards can be reformatted to use any file system (such as ext4, UFS, or VFAT), alleviating the restrictions associated with exFAT availability.


title: SD card

text: Except for the change of file system, SDXC cards are mostly backward compatible with SDHC readers, and many SDHC host devices can use SDXC cards if they are first reformatted to the FAT32 file system.


title: SD card

text: Nevertheless, in order to be fully compliant with the SDXC card specification, some SDXC-capable host devices are firmware-programmed to expect exFAT on cards larger than 32 GB. Consequently, they may not accept SDXC cards reformatted as FAT32, even if the device supports FAT32 on smaller cards (for SDHC compatibility). Therefore, even if a file system is supported in general, it is not always possible to use alternative file systems on SDXC cards at all depending on how strictly the SDXC card specification has been implemented in the host device. This bears a risk of accidental loss of data, as a host device may treat a card with an unrecognized file system as blank or damaged and reformat the card.


title: SD card

text: The SD Association provides a formatting utility for Windows and Mac OS X that checks and formats SD, SDHC, SDXC, and SDUC cards.


title: SD card

text: SD card speed is customarily rated by its sequential read or write speed. The sequential performance aspect is the most relevant for storing and retrieving large files (relative to block sizes internal to the flash memory), such as images and multimedia. Small data (such as file names, sizes and timestamps) falls under the much lower speed limit of random access, which can be the limiting factor in some use cases.


title: SD card

text: With early SD cards, a few card manufacturers specified the speed as a "times" ("×") rating, which compared the average speed of reading data to that of the original CD-ROM drive. This was superseded by the Speed Class Rating, which guarantees a minimum rate at which data can be written to the card.


title: SD card

text: The newer families of SD card improve card speed by increasing the bus rate (the frequency of the clock signal that strobes information into and out of the card). Whatever the bus rate, the card can signal to the host that it is "busy" until a read or a write operation is complete. Compliance with a higher speed rating is a guarantee that the card limits its use of the "busy" indication.


title: SD card

text: Cards that comply with UHS show Roman numerals 'I', 'II' or 'III' next to the SD card logo, and report this capability to the host device. Use of UHS-I requires that the host device command the card to drop from 3.3-volt to 1.8-volt operation over the I/O interface pins and select the four-bit transfer mode, while UHS-II requires 0.4-volt operation.


title: SD card

text: The higher speed rates are achieved by using a two-lane low voltage (0.4 V pp) differential interface. Each lane is capable of transferring up to 156 MB/s. In full-duplex mode, one lane is used for Transmit while the other is used for Receive. In half-duplex mode both lanes are used for the same direction of data transfer allowing a double data rate at the same clock speed. In addition to enabling higher data rates, the UHS-II interface allows for lower interface power consumption, lower I/O voltage and lower electromagnetic interference (EMI).


title: SD card

text: Specified in SD version 3.01. Supports a clock frequency of 100 MHz (a quadrupling of the original "Default Speed"), which in four-bit transfer mode could transfer 50 MB/s (SDR50). UHS-I cards declared as UHS104 (SDR104) also support a clock frequency of 208 MHz, which could transfer 104 MB/s. Double data rate operation at 50 MHz (DDR50) is also specified in Version 3.01, and is mandatory for microSDHC and microSDXC cards labeled as UHS-I. In this mode, four bits are transferred when the clock signal rises and another four bits when it falls, transferring an entire byte on each full clock cycle, hence a 50 MB/s operation could be transferred using a 50 MHz clock.


title: SD card

text: There is a proprietary UHS-I extension primarily by SanDisk that increases transfer speed further to 170 MB/s, called DDR208 (or DDR200). Unlike UHS-II, it does not use additional pins. It achieves this by using the 208 MHz frequency of the standard SDR104 mode, but using DDR transfers. This extension has since then been used by Lexar for their 1066x series (160 MB/s), Kingston Canvas Go Plus (170 MB/s) and the MyMemory PRO SD card (180 MB/s).


title: SD card

text: Specified in version 4.0, further raises the data transfer rate to a theoretical maximum of 156 MB/s (full-duplex) or 312 MB/s (half-duplex) using an additional row of pins (a total of 17 pins for full-size and 16 pins for micro-size cards). While first implementations in compact system cameras were seen three years after specification (2014), it took many more years until UHS-II was implemented on a regular basis. At the beginning of 2021, there were more than 50 DSLR and compact system cameras using UHS-II.


title: SD card

text: Version 6.0, released in February 2017, added two new data rates to the standard. FD312 provides 312 MB/s while FD624 doubles that. Both are full-duplex. The physical interface and pin-layout are the same as with UHS-II, retaining backward compatibility.


title: SD card

text: The SD Express bus was released in June 2018 with SD specification 7.0. It uses a single PCIe lane to provide full-duplex 985 MB/s transfer speed. Supporting cards must also implement the NVM Express storage access protocol. The Express bus can be implemented by SDHC, SDXC, and SDUC cards. For legacy application use, SD Express cards must also support High Speed bus and UHS-I bus. The Express bus re-uses the pin layout of UHS-II cards and reserves the space for additional two pins that may be introduced in the future.


title: SD card

text: Hosts which implement version 7.0 of the spec allow SD Cards to do direct memory access, which increases the attack surface of the host dramatically in the face of malicious SD cards.


title: SD card

text: Version 8.0 was announced on 19 May 2020, with support for two PCIe lanes with additional row of contacts and PCIe 4.0 transfer rates, for a maximum bandwidth of 3938 MB/s.


title: SD card

text: In February 2019, the SD Association announced microSD Express. The microSD Express cards offer PCI Express and NVMe interfaces, as the June 2018 SD Express release did, alongside the legacy microSD interface for continued backwards compatibility. The SDA also released visual marks to denote microSD Express memory cards to make matching the card and device easier for optimal device performance.


title: SD card

text: NOTE: If the card reader uses the DDR208 controller on the UHS 1 pins, the card reader will perform at 180MB/s on applicable UHS 1 cards


title: SD card

text: The SD Association defines standard speed classes for SDHC/SDXC cards indicating minimum performance (minimum serial data writing speed). Both read and write speeds must exceed the specified value. The specification defines these classes in terms of performance curves that translate into the following minimum read-write performance levels on an empty card and suitability for different applications:


title: SD card

text: The SD Association defines three types of Speed Class ratings: the original Speed Class, UHS Speed Class, and Video Speed Class.


title: SD card

text: Speed Class ratings 2, 4, and 6 assert that the card supports the respective number of megabytes per second as a minimum sustained write speed for a card in a fragmented state.


title: SD card

text: Class 10 asserts that the card supports 10 MB/s as a minimum non-fragmented sequential write speed and uses a High Speed bus mode. The host device can read a card's speed class and warn the user if the card reports a speed class that falls below an application's minimum need. By comparison, the older "×" rating measured maximum speed under ideal conditions, and was vague as to whether this was read speed or write speed.


title: SD card

text: UHS-I and UHS-II cards can use UHS Speed Class rating with two possible grades: class 1 for minimum write performance of at least 10 MB/s ('U1' symbol featuring number 1 inside 'U') and class 3 for minimum write performance of 30 MB/s ('U3' symbol featuring 3 inside 'U'), targeted at recording 4K video. Before November 2013, the rating was branded "UHS Speed Grade" and contained grades 0 (no symbol) and 1 ('U1' symbol). Manufacturers can also display standard speed class symbols (C2, C4, C6, and C10) alongside, or in place of UHS speed class.


title: SD card

text: UHS memory cards work best with UHS host devices. The combination lets the user record HD resolution videos with tapeless camcorders while performing other functions. It is also suitable for real-time broadcasts and capturing large HD videos.


title: SD card

text: Video Speed Class defines a set of requirements for UHS cards to match the modern MLC NAND flash memory and supports progressive 4K and 8K video with minimum sequential writing speeds of 6 – 90 MB/s. The graphical symbols use a stylized 'V' followed by a number designating write speed ("i.e." V6, V10, V30, V60, and V90).


title: SD card

text: "Application Performance Class" is a newly defined standard from the SD Specification 5.1 and 6.0 which not only define sequential Writing Speeds but also mandates a minimum IOPS for reading and writing. Class A1 requires a minimum of 1500 reading and 500 writing operations per second, while class A2 requires 4000 and 2000 IOPS. A2 class cards require host driver support as they use command queuing and write caching to achieve their higher speeds. If used in an unsupported host, they might even be slower than other A1 cards, and if power is lost before cached data is actually written from the card's internal RAM to the card's internal flash RAM, that data is likely to be lost.


title: SD card

text: The "×" rating, that was used by some card manufacturers and made obsolete by speed classes, is a multiple of the standard CD-ROM drive speed of 150 KB/s (approximately 1.23 Mbit/s). Basic cards transfer data at up to six times (6×) the CD-ROM speed; that is, 900 kbit/s or 7.37 Mbit/s. The 2.0 specification defines speeds up to 200×, but is not as specific as Speed Classes are on how to measure speed. Manufacturers may report best-case speeds and may report the card's fastest read speed, which is typically faster than the write speed. Some vendors, including Transcend and Kingston, report their cards' write speed. When a card lists both a speed class and an "×" rating, the latter may be assumed a read speed only.


title: SD card

text: In applications that require sustained write throughput, such as video recording, the device might not perform satisfactorily if the SD card's class rating falls below a particular speed. For example, a high-definition camcorder may require a card of not less than Class 6, suffering dropouts or corrupted video if a slower card is used. Digital cameras with slow cards may take a noticeable time after taking a photograph before being ready for the next, while the camera writes the first picture.


title: SD card

text: The speed class rating does not totally characterize card performance. Different cards of the same class may vary considerably while meeting class specifications. A card's speed depends on many factors, including:


title: SD card

text: In addition, speed may vary markedly between writing a large amount of data to a single file (sequential access, as when a digital camera records large photographs or videos) and writing a large number of small files (a random-access use common in smartphones). A study in 2012 found that, in this random-access use, some Class 2 cards achieved a write speed of 1.38 MB/s, while all cards tested of Class 6 or greater (and some of lower Classes; lower Class does not "necessarily" mean better small-file performance), including those from major manufacturers, were over 100 times slower. In 2014, a blogger measured a 300-fold performance difference on small writes; this time, the best card in this category was a class 4 card.


title: SD card

text: Cards can protect their contents from erasure or modification, prevent access by non-authorized users, and protect copyrighted content using digital rights management.


title: SD card

text: The host device can command the SD card to become read-only (to reject subsequent commands to write information to it). There are both reversible and irreversible host commands that achieve this.


title: SD card

text: Most full-size SD cards have a "mechanical write protect switch" allowing the user to advise the host computer that the user wants the device to be treated as read-only. This does not protect the data on the card if the host is compromised: "It is the responsibility of the host to protect the card. The position [i.e., setting] of the write protect switch is unknown to the internal circuitry of the card." Some host devices do not support write protection, which is an optional feature of the SD specification, and drivers and devices that do obey a read-only indication may give the user a way to override it.


title: SD card

text: The switch is a sliding tab that covers a notch in the card. The miniSD and microSD formats do not directly support a write protection notch, but they can be inserted into full-size adapters which do.


title: SD card

text: When looking at the SD card from the top, the right side (the side with the beveled corner) must be notched.


title: SD card

text: On the left side, there may be a write-protection notch. If the notch is omitted, the card can be read and written. If the card is notched, it is read-only. If the card has a notch and a sliding tab which covers the notch, the user can slide the tab upward (toward the contacts) to declare the card read/write, or downward to declare it read-only. The diagram to the right shows an orange sliding write-protect tab in both the unlocked and locked positions.


title: SD card

text: Cards sold with content that must not be altered are permanently marked read-only by having a notch and no sliding tab.


title: SD card

text: A host device can lock an SD card using a password of up to 16 bytes, typically supplied by the user. A locked card interacts normally with the host device except that it rejects commands to read and write data. A locked card can be unlocked only by providing the same password. The host device can, after supplying the old password, specify a new password or disable locking. Without the password (typically, in the case that the user forgets the password), the host device can command the card to erase all the data on the card for future re-use (except card data under DRM), but there is no way to gain access to the existing data.


title: SD card

text: Windows Phone 7 devices use SD cards designed for access only by the phone manufacturer or mobile provider. An SD card inserted into the phone underneath the battery compartment becomes locked "to the phone with an automatically generated key" so that "the SD card cannot be read by another phone, device, or PC". Symbian devices, however, are some of the few that can perform the necessary low-level format operations on locked SD cards. It is therefore possible to use a device such as the Nokia N8 to reformat the card for subsequent use in other devices.


title: SD card

text: A smartSD memory card is a microSD card with an internal "secure element" that allows the transfer of ISO 7816 Application Protocol Data Unit commands to, for example, JavaCard applets running on the internal secure element through the SD bus.


title: SD card

text: Some of the earliest versions of microSD memory cards with secure elements were developed in 2009 by DeviceFidelity, Inc., a pioneer in near field communication (NFC) and mobile payments, with the introduction of In2Pay and CredenSE products, later commercialized and certified for mobile contactless transactions by Visa in 2010. DeviceFidelity also adapted the In2Pay microSD to work with the Apple iPhone using the iCaisse, and pioneered the first NFC transactions and mobile payments on an Apple device in 2010.


title: SD card

text: Various implementations of smartSD cards have been done for payment applications and secured authentication. In 2012 Good Technology partnered with DeviceFidelity to use microSD cards with secure elements for mobile identity and access control.


title: SD card

text: microSD cards with Secure Elements and NFC (near field communication) support are used for mobile payments, and have been used in direct-to-consumer mobile wallets and mobile banking solutions, some of which were launched by major banks around the world, including Bank of America, US Bank, and Wells Fargo, while others were part of innovative new direct-to-consumer neobank programs such as moneto, first launched in 2012.


title: SD card

text: microSD cards with Secure Elements have also been used for secure voice encryption on mobile devices, which allows for one of the highest levels of security in person-to-person voice communications. Such solutions are heavily used in intelligence and security.


title: SD card

text: In 2011, HID Global partnered with Arizona State University to launch campus access solutions for students using microSD with Secure Element and MiFare technology provided by DeviceFidelity, Inc. This was the first time regular mobile phones could be used to open doors without need for electronic access keys.


title: SD card

text: Vendors have sought to differentiate their products in the market through various vendor-specific features:


title: SD card

text: A SDIO (Secure Digital Input Output) card is an extension of the SD specification to cover I/O functions. SDIO cards are only fully functional in host devices designed to support their input-output functions (typically PDAs like the Palm Treo, but occasionally laptops or mobile phones). These devices can use the SD slot to support GPS receivers, modems, barcode readers, FM radio tuners, TV tuners, RFID readers, digital cameras, and interfaces to Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, and IrDA. Many other SDIO devices have been proposed, but it is now more common for I/O devices to connect using the USB interface.


title: SD card

text: SDIO cards support most of the memory commands of SD cards. SDIO cards can be structured as eight logical cards, although currently, the typical way that an SDIO card uses this capability is to structure itself as one I/O card and one memory card.


title: SD card

text: The SDIO and SD interfaces are mechanically and electrically identical. Host devices built for SDIO cards generally accept SD memory cards without I/O functions. However, the reverse is not true, because host devices need suitable drivers and applications to support the card's I/O functions. For example, an HP SDIO camera usually does not work with PDAs that do not list it as an accessory. Inserting an SDIO card into any SD slot causes no physical damage nor disruption to the host device, but users may be frustrated that the SDIO card does not function fully when inserted into a seemingly compatible slot. (USB and Bluetooth devices exhibit comparable compatibility issues, although to a lesser extent thanks to standardized USB device classes and Bluetooth profiles.)


title: SD card

text: The SDIO family comprises Low-Speed and Full-Speed cards. Both types of SDIO cards support SPI and one-bit SD bus types. Low-Speed SDIO cards are allowed to also support the four-bit SD bus; Full-Speed SDIO cards are required to support the four-bit SD bus. To use an SDIO card as a "combo card" (for both memory and I/O), the host device must first select four-bit SD bus operation. Two other unique features of Low-Speed SDIO are a maximum clock rate of 400 kHz for all communications, and the use of Pin 8 as "interrupt" to try to initiate dialogue with the host device.


title: SD card

text: The one-bit SD protocol was derived from the MMC protocol, which envisioned the ability to put up to three cards on a bus of common signal lines. The cards use open collector interfaces, where a card may pull a line to the low voltage level; the line is at the high voltage level (because of a pull-up resistor) if no card pulls it low. Though the cards shared clock and signal lines, each card had its own chip select line to sense that the host device had selected it.


title: SD card

text: The SD protocol envisioned the ability to gang 30 cards together without separate chip select lines. The host device would broadcast commands to all cards and identify the card to respond to the command using its unique serial number.


title: SD card

text: In practice, cards are rarely ganged together because open-collector operation has problems at high speeds and increases power consumption. Newer versions of the SD specification recommend separate lines to each card.


title: SD card

text: Host devices that comply with newer versions of the specification provide backward compatibility and accept older SD cards. For example, SDXC host devices accept all previous families of SD memory cards, and SDHC host devices also accept standard SD cards.


title: SD card

text: Older host devices generally do not support newer card formats, and even when they might support the bus interface used by the card, there are several factors that arise:


title: SD card

text: Due to their compact size, Secure Digital cards are used in many consumer electronic devices, and have become a widespread means of storing several gigabytes of data in a small size. Devices in which the user may remove and replace cards often, such as digital cameras, camcorders, and video game consoles, tend to use full-sized cards. Devices in which small size is paramount, such as mobile phones, action cameras such as the GoPro Hero series, and camera drones, tend to use microSD cards.


title: SD card

text: The microSD card has helped propel the smartphone market by giving both manufacturers and consumers greater flexibility and freedom.


title: SD card

text: While cloud storage depends on stable internet connection and sufficiently voluminous data plans, memory cards in mobile devices provide location-independent and private storage expansion with much higher transfer rates and no latency (engineering)(), enabling applications such as photography and video recording. While data stored internally on bricked devices is inaccessible, data stored on the memory card can be salvaged and accessed externally by the user as mass storage device. A benefit over USB on the go storage expansion is uncompromised ergonomy. The usage of a memory card also protects the mobile phone's non-replaceable internal storage from weardown from heavy applications such as excessive camera usage and portable FTP server hosting over WiFi Direct. Due to the of memory cards, users of existing mobile devices are able to expand their storage further and priceworthier with time.


title: SD card

text: Recent versions of major operating systems such as Windows Mobile and Android allow applications to run from microSD cards, creating possibilities for new usage models for SD cards in mobile computing markets, as well as clearing available internal storage space.


title: SD card

text: SD cards are not the most economical solution in devices that need only a small amount of non-volatile memory, such as station presets in small radios. They may also not present the best choice for applications that require higher storage capacities or speeds as provided by other flash card standards such as CompactFlash. These limitations may be addressed by evolving memory technologies, such as the new SD 7.0 specifications which allow storage capabilities of up to 128 TB.


title: SD card

text: Many personal computers of all types, including tablets and mobile phones, use SD cards, either through built-in slots or through an active electronic adapter. Adapters exist for the PC card, ExpressBus, USB, FireWire, and the parallel printer port. Active adapters also let SD cards be used in devices designed for other formats, such as CompactFlash. The FlashPath adapter lets SD cards be used in a floppy disk drive.


title: SD card

text: Some devices such as the Samsung Galaxy Fit (2011) and Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 (2013) have an SD card compartment located externally and accessible by hand, while it is located under the battery cover on other devices. More recent mobile phones use a pin-hole ejection system for the tray which houses both the memory card and SIM card.


title: SD card

text: Commonly found on the market are mislabeled or counterfeit Secure Digital cards that report a fake capacity or run slower than labeled.


title: SD card

text: Software tools exist to check and detect counterfeit products. Detection of counterfeit cards usually involves copying files with random data to the SD card until the card's capacity is reached, and copying them back. The files that were copied back can be tested either by comparing checksums (e.g. MD5), or trying to compress them. The latter approach leverages the fact that counterfeited cards let the user read back files, which then consist of easily compressible uniform data (for example, repeating 0xFFs).


title: SD card

text: SD/MMC cards replaced Toshiba's SmartMedia as the dominant memory card format used in digital cameras. In 2001, SmartMedia had achieved nearly 50% use, but by 2005 SD/MMC had achieved over 40% of the digital camera market and SmartMedia's share had plummeted by 2007.


title: SD card

text: At this time, all the leading digital camera manufacturers used SD in their consumer product lines, including Canon, Casio, Fujifilm, Kodak, Leica, Nikon, Olympus, Panasonic, Pentax, Ricoh, Samsung, and Sony. Formerly, Olympus and Fujifilm used XD-Picture Cards (xD cards) exclusively, while Sony only used Memory Stick; by early 2010 all three supported SD.


title: SD card

text: Some prosumer and professional digital cameras continued to offer CompactFlash (CF), either on a second card slot or as the only storage, as CF supports much higher maximum capacities and historically was cheaper for the same capacity.


title: SD card

text: Secure Digital memory cards can be used in Sony XDCAM EX camcorders with an adapter and in Panasonic P2 card equipment with a MicroP2 adapter.


title: SD card

text: Although many personal computers accommodate SD cards as an auxiliary storage device using a built-in slot, or can accommodate SD cards by means of a USB adapter, SD cards cannot be used as the primary hard disk through the onboard ATA controller, because none of the SD card variants support ATA signalling. Primary hard disk use requires a separate SD host controller or an SD-to-CompactFlash converter. However, on computers that support bootstrapping from a USB interface, an SD card in a USB adapter can be the boot disk, provided it contains an operating system that supports USB access once the bootstrap is complete.


title: SD card

text: In laptop and tablet computers, memory cards in an integrated memory card reader offer an ergonomical benefit over USB flash drives, as the latter sticks out of the device, and the user would need to be cautious not to bump it while transporting the device, which could damage the USB port. Memory cards have a unified shape and do not reserve a USB port when inserted into a computer's dedicated card slot.


title: SD card

text: Since late 2009, newer Apple computers with installed SD card readers have been able to boot in macOS from SD storage devices, when properly formatted to Mac OS Extended file format and the default partition table set to GUID Partition Table. (See Other file systems below).


title: SD card

text: SD cards are increasing in usage and popularity among owners of vintage computers like 8-bit Atari. For example SIO2SD (SIO is an Atari port for connecting external devices) is used nowadays. Software for an 8-bit Atari may be included on one SD card that may have less than 4-8 GB of disk size (2019).


title: SD card

text: In 2008, the SDA specified Embedded SD, "leverag[ing] well-known SD standards" to enable non-removable SD-style devices on printed circuit boards. However this standard was not adopted by the market while the MMC standard became the de facto standard for embedded systems. SanDisk provides such embedded memory components under the iNAND brand.


title: SD card

text: Most modern microcontrollers have built-in SPI logic that can interface to an SD card operating in its SPI mode, providing non-volatile storage. Even if a microcontroller lacks the SPI feature, the feature can be emulated by bit banging. For example, a home-brew hack combines spare General Purpose Input/Output (GPIO) pins of the processor of the Linksys WRT54G router with MMC support code from the Linux kernel. This technique can achieve throughput of up to .


title: SD card

text: Prerecorded microSDs have been used to commercialize music under the brands slotMusic and slotRadio by SanDisk and MQS by Astell & Kern.


title: SD card

text: The SD card specification defines three physical sizes. The SD and SDHC families are available in all three sizes, but the SDXC and SDUC families are not available in the mini size, and the SDIO family is not available in the micro size. Smaller cards are usable in larger slots through use of a passive adapter.


title: SD card

text: Cards may support various combinations of the following bus types and transfer modes. The SPI bus mode and one-bit SD bus mode are mandatory for all SD families, as explained in the next section. Once the host device and the SD card negotiate a bus interface mode, the usage of the numbered pins is the same for all card sizes.


title: SD card

text: The physical interface comprises 9 pins, except that the miniSD card adds two unconnected pins in the center and the microSD card omits one of the two V (Ground) pins.


title: SD card

text: SD cards and host devices initially communicate through a synchronous one-bit interface, where the host device provides a clock signal that strobes single bits in and out of the SD card. The host device thereby sends 48-bit commands and receives responses. The card can signal that a response will be delayed, but the host device can abort the dialogue.


title: SD card

text: The command interface is an extension of the MultiMediaCard (MMC) interface. SD cards dropped support for some of the commands in the MMC protocol, but added commands related to copy protection. By using only commands supported by both standards until determining the type of card inserted, a host device can accommodate both SD and MMC cards.


title: SD card

text: All SD card families initially use a 3.3 volt electrical interface. On command, SDHC and SDXC cards can switch to 1.8 V operation.


title: SD card

text: At initial power-up or card insertion, the host device selects either the Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI) bus or the one-bit SD bus by the voltage level present on Pin 1. Thereafter, the host device may issue a command to switch to the four-bit SD bus interface, if the SD card supports it. For various card types, support for the four-bit SD bus is either optional or mandatory.


title: SD card

text: After determining that the SD card supports it, the host device can also command the SD card to switch to a higher transfer speed. Until determining the card's capabilities, the host device should not use a clock speed faster than 400 kHz. SD cards other than SDIO (see below) have a "Default Speed" clock rate of 25 MHz. The host device is not required to use the maximum clock speed that the card supports. It may operate at less than the maximum clock speed to conserve power. Between commands, the host device can stop the clock entirely.


title: SD card

text: The SD specification defines four-bit-wide transfers. (The MMC specification supports this and also defines an eight-bit-wide mode; MMC cards with extended bits were not accepted by the market.) Transferring several bits on each clock pulse improves the card speed. Advanced SD families have also improved speed by offering faster clock frequencies and double data rate (explained here) in a high-speed differential interface (UHS-II).


title: SD card

text: Like other types of flash memory card, an SD card of any SD family is a block-addressable storage device, in which the host device can read or write fixed-size blocks by specifying their block number.


title: SD card

text: Most SD cards ship preformatted with one or more MBR partitions, where the first or only partition contains a file system. This lets them operate like the hard disk of a personal computer. Per the SD card specification, an SD card is formatted with MBR and the following file system:


title: SD card

text: Most consumer products that take an SD card expect that it is partitioned and formatted in this way. Universal support for FAT12, FAT16, FAT16B, and FAT32 allows the use of SDSC and SDHC cards on most host computers with a compatible SD reader, to present the user with the familiar method of named files in a hierarchical directory tree.


title: SD card

text: On such SD cards, standard utility programs such as Mac OS X's "" or Windows' SCANDISK can be used to repair a corrupted filing system and sometimes recover deleted files. Defragmentation tools for FAT file systems may be used on such cards. The resulting consolidation of files may provide a marginal improvement in the time required to read or write the file, but not an improvement comparable to defragmentation of hard drives, where storing a file in multiple fragments requires additional physical, and relatively slow, movement of a drive head. Moreover, defragmentation performs writes to the SD card that count against the card's rated lifespan. The write endurance of the physical memory is discussed in the article on flash memory; newer technology to increase the storage capacity of a card provides worse write endurance.


title: SD card

text: When reformatting an SD card with a capacity of at least 32 MB (65,536 logical sectors or more), but not more than 2 GB, FAT16B with partition type 06h and EBPB 4.1 is recommended if the card is for a consumer device. (FAT16B is also an option for 4 GB cards, but it requires the use of 64 KB clusters, which are not widely supported.) FAT16B does not support cards above 4 GB at all.


title: SD card

text: The SDXC specification mandates the use of Microsoft's proprietary exFAT file system, which sometimes requires appropriate drivers (e.g. codice_1/codice_2 on Linux).


title: SD card

text: Because the host views the SD card as a block storage device, the card does not require MBR partitions or any specific file system. The card can be reformatted to use any file system the operating system supports. For example:


title: SD card

text: Additionally, as with live USB flash drives, an SD card can have an operating system installed on it. Computers that can boot from an SD card (either using a USB adapter or inserted into the computer's flash media reader) instead of the hard disk drive may thereby be able to recover from a corrupted hard disk drive. Such an SD card can be write-locked to preserve the system's integrity.


title: SD card

text: The SD Standard allows usage of only the above-mentioned Microsoft FAT file systems and any card produced in the market shall be preloaded with the related standard file system upon its delivery to the market. If any application or user re-formats the card with a non-standard file system the proper operation of the card, including interoperability, cannot be assured.


title: SD card

text: Reformatting an SD card with a different file system, or even with the same one, may make the card slower, or shorten its lifespan. Some cards use wear leveling, in which frequently modified blocks are mapped to different portions of memory at different times, and some wear-leveling algorithms are designed for the access patterns typical of FAT12, FAT16 or FAT32. In addition, the preformatted file system may use a cluster size that matches the erase region of the physical memory on the card; reformatting may change the cluster size and make writes less efficient. The SD Association provides freely-downloadable SD Formatter software to overcome these problems for Windows and Mac OS X.


title: SD card

text: SD/SDHC/SDXC memory cards have a "Protected Area" on the card for the SD standard's security function. Neither standard formatters nor the SD Association formatter will erase it. The SD Association suggests that devices or software which use the SD security function may format it.


title: SD card

text: During transfer it may be in the range of 66–330 mW (20–100 mA at a supply voltage of 3.3 V). Specifications from TwinMos Technologies list a maximum of 149 mW (45 mA) during transfer. Toshiba lists 264–330 mW (80–100 mA). Standby current is much lower, less than 0.2 mA for one 2006 microSD card. If there is data transfer for significant periods, battery life may be reduced noticeably; for reference, the capacity of smartphone batteries is typically around 6 Wh (Samsung Galaxy S2: 1650 mAh @ 3.7 V).


title: SD card

text: Modern UHS-II cards can consume up to 2.88 W, if the host device supports bus speed mode SDR104 or UHS-II. Minimum power consumption in the case of a UHS-II host is 720 mW.


title: SD card

text: All SD cards let the host device determine how much information the card can hold, and the specification of each SD family gives the host device a guarantee of the maximum capacity a compliant card reports.


title: SD card

text: By the time the version 2.0 (SDHC) specification was completed in June 2006, vendors had already devised 2 GB and 4 GB SD cards, either as specified in Version 1.01, or by creatively reading Version 1.00. The resulting cards do not work correctly in some host devices.


title: SD card

text: A host device can ask any inserted SD card for its 128-bit identification string (the Card-Specific Data or CSD). In standard-capacity cards (SDSC), 12 bits identify the number of memory clusters (ranging from 1 to 4,096) and 3 bits identify the number of blocks per cluster (which decode to 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, or 512 blocks per cluster). The host device multiplies these figures (as shown in the following section) with the number of bytes per block to determine the card's capacity in bytes.


title: SD card

text: SD version 1.00 assumed 512 bytes per block. This permitted SDSC cards up to 4,096 × 512 × 512 B = 1 GB, for which there are no known incompatibilities.


title: SD card

text: Version 1.01 let an SDSC card use a 4-bit field to indicate 1,024 or 2,048 bytes per block instead. Doing so enabled cards with 2 GB and 4 GB capacity, such as the Transcend 4 GB SD card and the Memorette 4 GB SD card.


title: SD card

text: Early SDSC host devices that assume 512-byte blocks therefore do not fully support the insertion of 2 GB or 4 GB cards. In some cases, the host device can read data that happens to reside in the first 1 GB of the card. If the assumption is made in the driver software, success may be version-dependent. In addition, any host device might not support a 4 GB SDSC card, since the specification lets it assume that 2 GB is the maximum for these cards.


title: SD card

text: The format of the Card-Specific Data (CSD) register changed between version 1 (SDSC) and version 2.0 (which defines SDHC and SDXC).


title: SD card

text: In version 1 of the SD specification, capacities up to 2 GB are calculated by combining fields of the CSD as follows:


title: SD card

text: Later versions state (at Section 4.3.2) that a 2 GB SDSC card shall set its READ_BL_LEN (and WRITE_BL_LEN) to indicate 1024 bytes, so that the above computation correctly reports the card's capacity; but that, for consistency, the host device shall not request (by CMD16) block lengths over 512 B.


title: SD card

text: In the definition of SDHC cards in version 2.0, the C_SIZE portion of the CSD is 22 bits and it indicates the memory size in multiples of 512 KB (the C_SIZE_MULT field is removed and READ_BL_LEN is no longer used to compute capacity). Two bits that were formerly reserved now identify the card family: 0 is SDSC; 1 is SDHC or SDXC; 2 and 3 are reserved. Because of these redefinitions, older host devices do not correctly identify SDHC or SDXC cards nor their correct capacity.


title: SD card

text: Capacities above 4 GB can only be achieved by following version 2.0 or later versions. In addition, capacities equal to 4 GB must also do so to guarantee compatibility.


title: SD card

text: Like most memory card formats, SD is covered by numerous patents and trademarks. Excluding SDIO cards, royalties for SD card licenses are imposed for manufacture and sale of memory cards and host adapters (US$1,000/year plus membership at US$1,500/year)


title: SD card

text: Early versions of the SD specification were available under a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) prohibiting development of open-source drivers. However, the system was eventually reverse-engineered and free software drivers provided access to SD cards not using DRM. Subsequent to the release of most open-source drivers, the SDA provided a simplified version of the specification under a less restrictive license helping reduce some incompatibility issues.


title: SD card

text: Under a disclaimers agreement, the simplified specification released by the SDA in 2006 – as opposed to that of SD cards – was later extended to the physical layer, ASSD extensions, SDIO, and SDIO Bluetooth Type-A.


title: SD card

text: Again, most of the information had already been discovered and Linux had a fully free driver for it. Still, building a chip conforming to this specification caused the One Laptop per Child project to claim "the first truly Open Source SD implementation, with no need to obtain an SDI license or sign NDAs to create SD drivers or applications."


title: SD card

text: The proprietary nature of the complete SD specification affects embedded systems, laptop computers, and some desktop computers; many desktop computers do not have card slots, instead using USB-based card readers if necessary. These card readers present a standard USB mass storage interface to memory cards, thus separating the operating system from the details of the underlying SD interface. However, embedded systems (such as portable music players) usually gain direct access to SD cards and thus need complete programming information. Desktop card readers are themselves embedded systems; their manufacturers have usually paid the SDA for complete access to the SD specifications. Many notebook computers now include SD card readers not based on USB; device drivers for these essentially gain direct access to the SD card, as do embedded systems.


title: SD card

text: The SPI-bus interface mode is the only type that does not require a host license for accessing SD cards.


title: SD card

text: Overall, SD is less open than CompactFlash or USB flash memory drives. Those open standards can be implemented without paying for licensing, royalties, or documentation. (CompactFlash and USB flash drives may require licensing fees for the use of the SDA's trademarked logos.)


title: SD card

text: However, SD is much more open than Sony's Memory Stick, for which no public documentation nor any documented legacy implementation is available. All SD cards can be accessed freely using the well-documented SPI bus.


title: SD card

text: xD cards are simply 18-pin NAND flash chips in a special package and support the standard command set for raw NAND flash access. Although the raw hardware interface to xD cards is well understood, the layout of its memory contents—necessary for interoperability with xD card readers and digital cameras—is totally undocumented. The consortium that licenses xD cards has not released any technical information to the public.


title: SD card

text: A malfunctioning SD card can be repaired using specialized equipment, as long as the middle part, containing the flash storage, is not physically damaged. The controller can in this way be circumvented. This might be harder or even impossible in the case of monolithic card, where the controller resides on the same physical die.


title: Oppo

text: Guangdong Oppo Mobile Telecommunications Corp., Ltd, doing business as OPPO, is a Chinese consumer electronics manufacturer headquartered in Dongguan, Guangdong. Its major product lines include smartphones, smart devices, audio devices, power banks, and other electronic products.


title: Oppo

text: The brand name "Oppo" was registered in China in 2001 and launched in 2004. Since then, the company has expanded to 50 countries.


title: Oppo

text: In June 2016, OPPO became the largest smartphone manufacturer in China, selling its phones at more than 200,000 retail outlets. OPPO was the top smartphone brand in China in 2019 and was ranked No. 5, in market share, worldwide.


title: Oppo

text: The South Korean boy band 2PM prepared a song known as "Follow Your Soul" in a promotional deal with OPPO for launching its brand in Thailand in 2010. In June 2015, the company signed an agreement with FC Barcelona to become a sponsor of the Spanish football club.


title: Oppo

text: In 2016, the Philippine Basketball Association tied up with this company as its official smartphone partner, beginning with the 2016 PBA Commissioner's Cup which began on 10 February.


title: Oppo

text: OPPO hires celebrity endorsers in Vietnam. Sơn Tùng M-TP endorsed three smartphone units: Neo 5, Neo 7, and F1s. OPPO made a sponsorship to one of Vietnam's top-rated reality shows, "The Face Vietnam".


title: Oppo

text: In 2017, OPPO won the bid to sponsor the India national cricket team, which allows their logo to be used on the team's kits from 2017 to 2019.


title: Oppo

text: In 2019, OPPO became a sponsoring partner of the French Open tennis tournament held in Roland-Garros, Paris. The same year, they also became a sponsoring partner of Wimbledon for 5 years as the first official smartphone partner.


title: Oppo

text: Starting with the 2019 World Championship, OPPO is the exclusive global smartphone partner for "League of Legends" esports through 2024, OPPO will have year-round activations centered around the sport’s three annual global tournaments: the Mid-Season Invitational, the All-Star Event, and the World Championship.


title: Oppo

text: Released in 2015, the HA-2, was a portable version of the HA-1 amp/DAC, which featured a battery pack option and a stitched leather casing. The phone played music in real-time to the HA-2 (via the included Android micro USB cable or iOS lightning cable, or USB cable if from PC). It also can be charged using an included "rapid charger" charging kit. The battery pack feature can only be used simultaneously while the HA-2 is used to play music if the playing (source) device is an Apple iOS device. In October 2016, an updated version was released with a new DAC chip and now named HA-2SE. Otherwise, it was the same as the HA-2.


title: Oppo

text: In 2021, the WIPO's annual review of the World Intellectual Property Indicators report ranked Oppo as 8th in the world according to the number of patent applications published under the PCT System, with 1,801 patent applications being published during 2020. This position is down from their previous ranking as 5th in 2019 with 1,927 applications.


title: Oppo

text: In February 2022, OPPO announced a three-year partnership with Hasselblad, to co-develop industry-leading camera technologies for OPPO’s flagship Find X series. The triple-camera 5G handset


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla ( ) is a British Overseas Territory in the Caribbean. It is one of the most northerly of the Leeward Islands in the Lesser Antilles, lying east of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands and directly north of Saint Martin. The territory consists of the main island of Anguilla, approximately long by wide at its widest point, together with a number of much smaller islands and cays with no permanent population. The territory's capital is The Valley. The total land area of the territory is , with a population of approximately ().


title: Anguilla

text: In reference to the island's shape, the Italian "", meaning "eel" (in turn, from the Latin diminutive of "anguis", "snake") was used as its name.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla was first settled by Indigenous Amerindian peoples who migrated from South America. The earliest Native American artefacts found on Anguilla have been dated to around 1300 BC; remains of settlements date from AD 600.


title: Anguilla

text: There are two known petroglyph sites in Anguilla: Big Spring and Fountain Cavern. The rock ledges of Big Spring contain over 100 petroglyphs (dating back to AD 600-1200), the majority consisting of three indentations that form faces.


title: Anguilla

text: Precisely when Anguilla was first seen by Europeans is uncertain: some sources claim that Columbus sighted the island during his second voyage in 1493, while others state that the first European explorer was the French Huguenot nobleman and merchant René Goulaine de Laudonnière in 1564. The Dutch West India Company established a fort on the island in 1631. However, the Company later withdrew after its fort was destroyed by the Spanish in 1633.


title: Anguilla

text: Traditional accounts state that Anguilla was first colonised by English settlers from Saint Kitts beginning in 1650. The settlers focused on planting tobacco, and to a lesser extent cotton. The French temporarily took over the island in 1666 but returned it to English control under the terms of the Treaty of Breda the next year. Major John Scott who visited in September 1667, wrote of leaving the island "in good condition" and noted that in July 1668, "200 or 300 people fled thither in time of war". The French attacked again in 1688, 1745 and 1798, causing much destruction but failing to capture the island.


title: Anguilla

text: It is likely that the early European settlers brought enslaved Africans with them. Historians confirm that African slaves lived in the region in the early 17th century, such as slaves from Senegal living on St Kitts in the mid-1600s. By 1672 a slave depot existed on the island of Nevis, serving the Leeward Islands. While the time of African arrival in Anguilla is difficult to place precisely, archival evidence indicates a substantial African presence of at least 100 enslaved people by 1683; these seem to have come from Central Africa as well as West Africa. The slaves were forced to work on the sugar plantations which had begun to replace tobacco as Anguilla's main crop. Over time the African slaves and their descendants came to vastly outnumber the white settlers. The African slave trade was eventually terminated within the British Empire in 1807, and slavery outlawed completely in 1834. Many planters subsequently sold up or left the island.


title: Anguilla

text: During the early colonial period, Anguilla was administered by the British through Antigua; in 1825, it was placed under the administrative control of nearby Saint Kitts. Anguilla was federated with St Kitts and Nevis in 1882, against the wishes of many Anguillans. Economic stagnation, and the severe effects of several droughts in the 1890s and later the Great Depression of the 1930s led many Anguillans to emigrate for better prospects elsewhere.


title: Anguilla

text: Full adult suffrage was introduced to Anguilla in 1952. After a brief period as part of the West Indies Federation (1958–62), the island of Anguilla became part of the associated state of Saint Kitts-Nevis-Anguilla with full internal autonomy in 1967. However many Anguillans had no wish to be a part of this union, and resented the dominance of St Kitts within it. On 30 May 1967 Anguillans forcibly ejected the St Kitts police force from the island and declared their separation from St Kitts following a referendum. The events, led by Atlin Harrigan and Ronald Webster among others, became known as the Anguillan Revolution; its goal was not independence per se, but rather independence from Saint Kitts and Nevis and a return to being a British colony.


title: Anguilla

text: With negotiations failing to break the deadlock, a second referendum confirming Anguillans' desire for separation from St Kitts was held and the Republic of Anguilla was declared unilaterally, with Ronald Webster as president. Efforts by British envoy William Whitlock failed to break the impasse and 300 British troops were subsequently sent in March 1969. British authority was restored, and confirmed by the Anguilla Act of July 1971. In 1980, Anguilla was finally allowed to formally secede from Saint Kitts and Nevis and become a separate British Crown colony (now a British overseas territory). Since then, Anguilla has been politically stable, and has seen a large growth in its tourism and offshore financing sectors.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla is a flat, low-lying island of coral and limestone in the Caribbean Sea, measuring some 16 miles (26 km) long and 3.5 miles (6 km) in width. It lies to the east of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands and directly north of Saint Martin, separated from that island by the Anguilla Channel. The soil is generally thin and poor, supporting scrub, tropical and forest vegetation. The terrain is generally low-lying, with the highest terrain located in the vicinity of The Valley; Crocus Hill, Anguilla's highest peak at , lies in the western regions of the town.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla is noted for its ecologically important coral reefs and beaches. Apart from the main island of Anguilla itself, the territory includes a number of other smaller islands and cays, mostly tiny and uninhabited:


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla (and the wider Anguilla Bank) is of volcanic origin, lying on the Lesser Antilles volcanic island arc, and tuffs and volcaniclastic breccias of Eocene age are exposed locally on the island. The island was largely submerged during the Miocene, leading to the formation of the reefal limestone Anguilla Formation, which was subsequently tectonically uplifted and cover most of the island today. Since the late Pleistocene, however, Anguilla has undergone tectonic subsidence at a rate of around 1-2mm/yr.


title: Anguilla

text: Northeastern trade winds keep this tropical island relatively cool and dry. Average annual temperature is . July–October is its hottest period, December–February, its coolest.


title: Anguilla

text: Rainfall averages annually, although the figures vary from season to season and year to year. The island is subject to both sudden tropical storms and hurricanes, which occur in the period from July to November. The island suffered damage in 1995 from Hurricane Luis and severe flooding from Hurricane Lenny in 1999.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla is an internally self-governing overseas territory of the United Kingdom. Its politics take place in a framework of a parliamentary representative democratic dependency, whereby the Premier is the head of government, and of a pluriform multi-party system.


title: Anguilla

text: The United Nations Committee on Decolonization includes Anguilla on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories. The territory's constitution is the Anguilla Constitutional Order 1 April 1982 (amended 1990). Executive power is exercised by the government, with legislative power being vested in both the government and the House of Assembly. The judiciary is independent of the executive and the legislature.


title: Anguilla

text: As a British overseas territory, the UK is responsible for Anguilla's military defence, although there are no active garrisons or armed forces present in the territory. Since 2020, the Royal Navy has forward-deployed the offshore patrol vessel HMS Medway long-term to the Caribbean for patrol and sovereignty protection duties.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla had a small marine police force, comprising around 32 personnel, which operated one VT Halmatic M160-class 52-foot fast patrol boat. Policing on the island is the responsibility of the Royal Anguilla Police Force.


title: Anguilla

text: The majority of residents (90.08%) are black, most of whom are the descendants of enslaved people transported from Africa. Minorities include whites at 3.74% and people of mixed race at 4.65% (figures from 2001 census).


title: Anguilla

text: 72% of the population is Anguillan while 28% is non-Anguillan (2001 census). Of the non-Anguillan population, many are citizens of the United States, United Kingdom, St Kitts & Nevis, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica and Nigeria.


title: Anguilla

text: 2006 and 2007 saw an influx of large numbers of Chinese, Indian and Mexican workers, brought in as labour for major tourist developments due to the local population not being large enough to support the labour requirements.


title: Anguilla

text: Christian churches did not have a consistent or strong presence during the initial period of English colonisation; spiritual and religious practices of Europeans and Africans tended to reflect their regional origins. As early as 1813, Christian ministers formally ministered to enslaved Africans and promoted literacy among converts. The Wesleyan (Methodist) Missionary Society of England built churches and schools from 1817.


title: Anguilla

text: According to the 2001 census, Christianity is Anguilla's predominant religion, with 29% of the population practising Anglicanism; another 23.9% are Methodist. Other churches on the island include Seventh-day Adventist, Baptist, Roman Catholic (served by the Diocese of Saint John's–Basseterre, with the See at Saint John on Antigua and Barbuda) and a small community of Jehovah's Witnesses (0.7%). Between 1992 and 2001, the number of followers of the Church of God and Pentecostals increased considerably. There are at least 15 churches on the island. Although a minority on the island, Anguilla is an important location to followers of Rastafarian religion as the birthplace of Robert Athlyi Rogers, author of the "Holy Piby" which had a strong influence on Rastafarian and other Africa-centre belief systems. More recently, a Muslim cultural centre has opened on the island.


title: Anguilla

text: Today most people in Anguilla speak a British-influenced variety of standard English. Other languages are also spoken on the island, including varieties of Spanish, Chinese and the languages of other immigrant communities. However, the most common language other than Standard English is the island's own English-lexifier Creole language (not to be confused with Antillean Creole ('French Creole'), spoken in French islands such as Martinique and Guadeloupe). It is referred to locally by terms such as "dialect" (pronounced "dialek"), Anguilla Talk or "Anguillian". It has its main roots in early varieties of English and West African languages, and is similar to the dialects spoken in English-speaking islands throughout the Eastern Caribbean in terms of its structural features.


title: Anguilla

text: Linguists who are interested in the origins of Anguillan and other Caribbean Creoles point out that some of its grammatical features can be traced to African languages while others can be traced to European languages. Three areas have been identified as significant for the identification of the linguistic origins of those forced migrants who arrived before 1710: the Gold Coast, the Slave Coast and the Windward Coast.


title: Anguilla

text: Sociohistorical information from Anguilla's archives suggest that Africans and Europeans formed two distinct, but perhaps overlapping speech communities in the early phases of the island's colonisation. "Anguillian" is believed to have emerged as the language of the masses as time passed, slavery was abolished and locals began to see themselves as "belonging" to Anguillan society.


title: Anguilla

text: There are six government primary schools, one government secondary school (Albena Lake Hodge Comprehensive School), and two private schools. There is a single library, the Edison L. Hughes Education & Library Complex of the Anguilla Public Library. A branch of the Saint James School of Medicine was established in 2011 in Anguilla. It is a private, for-profit medical school headquartered in Park Ridge, Illinois.


title: Anguilla

text: The island's cultural history begins with the native Taino, Arawak and Carib. Their artefacts have been found around the island, telling of life before European settlers arrived.


title: Anguilla

text: The Anguilla National Trust (ANT) was established in 1989 and opened its current office in 1991 charged with the responsibility of preserving the heritage of the island, including its cultural heritage.


title: Anguilla

text: As throughout the Caribbean, holidays are a cultural fixture. Anguilla's most important holidays are of historic as much as cultural importance – particularly the anniversary of the emancipation (previously August Monday in the Park), celebrated as the Summer Festival, or Carnival. British festivities, such as the King's Birthday, are also celebrated.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguillan cuisine is influenced by native Caribbean, African, Spanish, French, and English cuisines. Seafood is abundant, including prawns, shrimp, crab, spiny lobster, conch, mahi-mahi, red snapper, marlin, and grouper. Salt cod is a staple food eaten on its own and used in stews, casseroles and soups. Livestock is limited due to the small size of the island and people there use poultry, pork, goat, and mutton, along with imported beef. Goat is the most commonly eaten meat, used in a variety of dishes. The official national food of Anguilla is pigeon peas and rice.


title: Anguilla

text: A significant amount of the island's produce is imported due to limited land suitable for agriculture production; much of the soil is sandy and infertile. The agriculture produce of Anguilla includes tomatoes, peppers, limes and other citrus fruits, onion, garlic, squash, pigeon peas, and callaloo. Starch staple foods include imported rice and other foods that are imported or locally grown, including yams, sweet potatoes and breadfruit.


title: Anguilla

text: The Anguilla National Trust has programmes encouraging Anguillan writers and the preservation of the island's history. In 2015, "Where I See The Sun – Contemporary Poetry in Anguilla" A New Anthology by Lasana M. Sekou was published by House of Nehesi Publishers. Among the forty three poets in the collection are Rita Celestine-Carty, Bankie Banx, John T. Harrigan, Patricia J. Adams, Fabian Fahie, Dr. Oluwakemi Linda Banks, and Reuel Ben Lewi.


title: Anguilla

text: Boat racing has deep roots in Anguillan culture and is the national sport. There are regular sailing regattas on national holidays, such as Carnival, which are contested by locally built and designed boats. These boats have names and have sponsors that print their logo on their sails.


title: Anguilla

text: As in many other former British colonies, cricket is also a popular sport. Anguilla is the home of Omari Banks, who played for the West Indies Cricket Team, while Cardigan Connor played first-class cricket for English county side Hampshire and was 'chef de mission' (team manager) for Anguilla's Commonwealth Games team in 2002. Other noted players include Chesney Hughes, who played for Derbyshire County Cricket Club in England.


title: Anguilla

text: Rugby union is represented in Anguilla by the Anguilla Eels RFC, who were formed in April 2006. The Eels have been finalists in the St. Martin tournament in November 2006 and semi-finalists in 2007, 2008, 2009 and Champions in 2010. The Eels were formed in 2006 by Scottish club national second row Martin Welsh, Club Sponsor and President of the AERFC Ms. Jacquie Ruan, and Canadian standout Scrumhalf Mark Harris (Toronto Scottish RFC).


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla is the birthplace of sprinter Zharnel Hughes who has represented Great Britain since 2015, and England at the 2018 Commonwealth Games. He won the 100 metres at the 2018 European Athletics Championships, the 4 x 100 metres at the same championships, and the 4 x 100 metres for England at the 2018 Commonwealth Games. He also won a relay team gold at the 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games and a silver on the relay for Great Britain at the 2020 Olympic Games.


title: Anguilla

text: Shara Proctor, British Long Jump Silver Medalist in World Championships in Beijing first represented Anguilla in the event until 2010 when she began to represent Great Britain and England. Under the Anguillan Flag she achieved several medals in the NACAC games.


title: Anguilla

text: Keith Connor, triple jumper, is also an Anguillan. He represented Great Britain and England and achieved several international titles including Commonwealth and European Games gold medals and an Olympic bronze medal. Keith later became Head Coach of Australia Athletics.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla has habitat for the Cuban tree frogs ("Osteopilus septentrionalis"). The red-footed tortoise ("Chelonoidis carbonaria") is a species of tortoise found here, which originally came from South America. Hurricanes in the mid-90s led to over-water dispersal of the green iguanas ("Iguana iguana") to Anguilla. All three animals are introductions.


title: Anguilla

text: Five species of bats are known in the literature from Anguilla – the threatened insular single leaf bat ("Monophyllus plethodon"), the Antillean fruit-eating bat ("Brachyphylla cavernarum"), the Jamaican fruit bat ("Artibeus jamaicensis"), the Mexican funnel-eared bat ("Natalus stramineus"), and the velvety free-tailed bat ("Molossus molossus").


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla's thin arid soil being largely unsuitable for agriculture, the island has few land-based natural resources. Its main industries are tourism, offshore incorporation and management, offshore banking, captive insurance and fishing.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla's currency is the East Caribbean dollar, though the US dollar is also widely accepted. The exchange rate is fixed to the US dollar at US$1 = EC$2.70.


title: Anguilla

text: The economy, and especially the tourism sector, suffered a setback in late 1995 due to the effects of Hurricane Luis in September. Hotels were hit particularly hard but a recovery occurred the following year. Another economic setback occurred during the aftermath of Hurricane Lenny in 2000. Before the 2008 worldwide crisis, the economy of Anguilla was growing strongly, especially the tourism sector, which was driving major new developments in partnerships with multi-national companies. Anguilla's tourism industry received a major boost when it was selected to host the World Travel Awards in December 2014. Known as "the Oscars of the travel industry", the awards ceremony was held at the CuisinArt Resort and Spa and was hosted by Vivica A. Fox. Anguilla was voted the World's Leading Luxury Island Destination from a short list of top-tier candidates such as St. Barts, the Maldives, and Mauritius.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla's financial system comprises seven banks, two money services businesses, more than 40 company managers, more than 50 insurers, 12 brokers, more than 250 captive intermediaries, more than 50 mutual funds, and eight trust companies.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla has become a popular tax haven, having no capital gains, estate, profit, sales, or corporate taxes. In April 2011, faced with a mounting deficit, it introduced a 3% "Interim Stabilisation Levy", Anguilla's first form of income tax. Anguilla also has a 0.75% property tax.


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla aims to obtain 15% of its energy from solar power to become less reliant on expensive imported diesel. The Climate & Development Knowledge Network is helping the government gather the information it needs to change the territory's legislation, so that it can integrate renewables into its grid. Barbados has also made good progress in switching to renewables, but many other Small Island Developing States are still at the early stages of planning how to integrate renewable energy into their grids. "For a small island we're very far ahead," said Beth Barry, Coordinator of the Anguilla Renewable Energy Office. "We've got an Energy Policy and a draft Climate Change policy and have been focusing efforts on the question of sustainable energy supply for several years now. As a result, we have a lot of information we can share with other islands."


title: Anguilla

text: Anguilla is served by Clayton J. Lloyd International Airport (prior to 4 July 2010 known as Wallblake Airport). The primary runway at the airport is in length and can accommodate moderate-sized aircraft. Regional scheduled passenger services connect to various other Caribbean islands via local airlines.


title: Anguilla

text: In December 2021 Anguilla inaugurated its first ever international regular commercial jet service flight to and from the mainland U.S. American Eagle operating on behalf of American Airlines began nonstop Embraer 175 regional jet service to Anguilla from Miami in an aviation watershed moment for Anguilla with the airport also currently attempting to attract other international air carriers.


title: Anguilla

text: Other airlines currently serving the airport include Tradewind Aviation and Cape Air which provide scheduled air service to San Juan, Puerto Rico. Several other small airlines serve the airport as well.


title: Anguilla

text: The airport can handle large narrow-body jets such as the Boeing 737 and Airbus A320 and has growing private jet service flights with a new private jet terminal being built.


title: Anguilla

text: There are regular ferries from Saint Martin to Anguilla. It is a 20-minute crossing from Marigot, St. Martin to Blowing Point, Anguilla. Ferries commence service from 7:00 am. There is also a charter service, from Blowing Point, Anguilla to Princess Juliana Airport to make travel easier. This way of travel is the most common method of transport between Anguilla and St. Martin.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Susan Marie Powell ( Cox; born October 16, 1981) is an American missing person from West Valley City, Utah, whose disappearance and presumed murder, as well as the subsequent investigation and events, garnered national media attention. Susan's husband Joshua was named a person of interest in the investigation into her disappearance, but was never charged. On February 5, 2012, Joshua killed himself and their two young sons, Charles Joshua Powell (January 19, 2005 – February 5, 2012) and Braden Timothy Powell (January 2, 2007 – February 5, 2012) in a murder–suicide after custody of the boys had been awarded to Susan's parents, Judy and Charles Cox.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: On May 21, 2013, West Valley City police closed their active investigation into Susan's disappearance, stating that they believed Joshua murdered her and that his brother, Michael – who also committed suicide in February 2013 after suspicion grew around him – had assisted him in concealing her body. Since then, there have been repeated attempts to have Susan legally declared dead.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Joshua Powell was born on January 20, 1976, to Steven and Terrica Powell in Puyallup, Washington. Joshua's parents had a dysfunctional marriage, caused in large part by Steven's disaffection with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). According to divorce filings by Terrica in 1992, Steven shared pornography with Joshua and his two brothers and refused to teach or enforce limits on certain behaviors. As a teenager, Joshua allegedly killed gerbils belonging to one of his sisters and threatened his mother with a butcher knife. He also attempted suicide on at least one occasion.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: By the late 1990s, Joshua was living in Seattle as a student at the University of Washington. It was here that he began a relationship with a young woman named Catherine Terry Everett, whom he met at a local LDS Church congregation. After the two moved into an apartment together, Joshua became possessive towards Everett. "He would have restrictions and limitations on what I could and couldn't do when it came to my family," she later recalled. "If I was going to go visit them, he had to come too. I couldn't go by myself." When Everett visited a friend in Utah without Joshua, she decided not to return to Seattle and broke up with him over the phone.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Joshua met Susan Cox, a classmate at his LDS Church Institute of Religion course, during a dinner party at his Tacoma apartment in November 2000. The two began a relationship and married in the Portland Oregon Temple in April 2001. Joshua had a bachelor's degree in business and worked for a number of different companies over the years, while Susan, a trained cosmetologist, took up a job with Wells Fargo Investments after the family's relocation to West Valley City, Utah, a suburb of Salt Lake City. The Powells went on to have two sons: Charles, born in 2005, and Braden, born in 2007.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: For a brief period following their wedding, Joshua and Susan lived at Steven Powell's home in South Hill, Washington. Initially unbeknownst to Susan, her father-in-law Steven had developed an obsessive infatuation with her which was only inflamed by their close proximity. Steven followed Susan around the house with a camcorder, used a small mirror to spy on her while she used the bathroom, stole her underwear from her laundry, read her journals, and even posted love songs online under a pseudonym. In 2003, Steven confessed his amorous feelings to a stunned Susan, who rejected him; the encounter was inadvertently captured by Steven's camcorder microphone. The Powells moved out-of-state soon after, partly so Susan could distance herself from Steven.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Susan's journal entries and email correspondence indicated the presence of marital discord. There was tension with Joshua over his refusal to attend church services with his family, and over his continued contact with Steven despite his father's ongoing advances toward Susan. Susan's friends also pointed to Joshua's "extremely controlling" behavior towards his wife and to his extravagant spending habits. Joshua filed for bankruptcy in 2007, declaring over $200,000 in debts. Susan recorded a video in July 2008 surveying property damage she attributed to Joshua, and wrote a secret will that included the statements, "I want it documented that there is extreme turmoil in our marriage" and, "If I die, it may not be an accident, even if it looks like one."


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: On the morning of December 6, 2009, Susan, Charles and Braden attended church services. A neighbor visited them at home in the afternoon, leaving at about 5:00 p.m. This was the last time Susan was seen by someone from outside the Powell household.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: At first, the entire Powell family was reported missing on December 7 by relatives. Joshua's mother, Terrica, and sister, Jennifer Graves, went looking for them at their house shortly after being informed that the children had not been dropped off at daycare that morning. They called the police when they failed to make contact with Joshua and Susan. The police broke into the house, fearing that the family members were victims of carbon monoxide poisoning. They found no one inside, but noticed two box fans blowing at a wet spot on the couch. Susan did not show up at her job on December 7; her purse, wallet, and identification were all found at the house. Her cell phone was later found in the family's only vehicle, a Chrysler Town & Country minivan, that Joshua had been using.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Later that day, at about 5:00 p.m., Joshua returned home with the two boys and was taken to the police station for questioning. He claimed he had left Susan sleeping at home shortly after midnight on December 7, and had taken his boys on a camping trip to Simpson Springs in western Utah. Police visited Simpson Springs on December 10, but found no evidence of the campsite that Joshua had described. They also found it suspicious that Joshua would take his young boys out camping in blizzard conditions after midnight when they were scheduled to go to daycare just hours later. Joshua had additionally not told his boss that he would not be coming into work that day, and explained to police it was because he had thought it was Sunday rather than Monday.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Upon searching the Powell residence on December 9, investigators found traces of Susan's blood on the floor, life insurance policies on Susan for , and a handwritten letter from Susan expressing fear for her life. DNA test results, released in 2013, matched one blood sample with Susan, while another sample was determined to have come from an "unknown male contributor".


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: In August 2012, West Valley City police released documents showing that Joshua took actions that were regarded as highly suspicious following Susan's disappearance. Joshua liquidated Susan's retirement accounts, cancelled her regularly scheduled chiropractic sessions, and withdrew his children from daycare. He had also previously spoken to coworkers about how to hide a body in an abandoned mineshaft in the western Utah desert.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Police interviewed the couple's elder son, Charlie, who confirmed that the camping trip Joshua described took place; however, unlike his father, he stated that Susan had gone with them and she did not return. Weeks after her disappearance, a teacher reported that Charlie had claimed that his mother was dead. Furthermore, Susan's parents, Chuck and Judy Cox, claimed that while at daycare several months after the disappearance, Braden drew a picture of a van with three people in it and told carers that, "Mommy was in the trunk".


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Investigators informed the media that they planned to question Joshua again, and subpoenaed all footage and interviews (aired and unaired) of Joshua from local television stations. On December 14, Joshua retained an attorney in connection with the investigation, and police said that he grew increasingly uncooperative. A few days later, he took his sons to Puyallup to stay with Steven for the holidays. By December 24, Joshua was considered a person of interest in the investigation. On January 6, 2010, he returned with his brother, Michael, to pack the family's belongings, indicating he was moving permanently to Puyallup.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: In Puyallup, Joshua occupied a home with his two sons, his father Steven, his brothers Michael and Jonathan, and his sister Alina. Joshua indicated that he would rent out his house in Utah. It was reported that he returned to Puyallup after he had lost his job.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Soon afterwards, the website SusanPowell.org was launched. Described as "the official website of Susan Powell", the site's anonymous entries defended Joshua as the victim of a smear campaign by Susan's family, his estranged sister Jennifer, and the LDS Church. Additional posts also speculated that Susan's disappearance was connected to that of Steven Koecher, a former journalist who vanished the same week as Susan, and that the two had run off to Brazil together. Joshua and Steven were widely believed to have written these posts. In late 2010, both men claimed that Susan had abandoned her family due to mental illness and that she had left with another man. Susan's family rejected these claims as being "unsupported" by any evidence.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Investigators' scrutiny extended to Steven upon learning from a family friend that he had been obsessed with his son's wife. Computer images seized from his house in 2010 turned up 4,500 images of Susan taken without her knowledge, including close-ups of specific body parts. Police also turned their attention to Michael after learning that he had sold his broken-down Ford Taurus to a wrecking yard in Pendleton, Oregon, shortly after Susan's disappearance, and had later ordered satellite images of the lot. When police found the car, a sniffer dog indicated that a decomposing human body had been in the trunk. DNA tests on the car proved inconclusive.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: On September 14, 2011, Utah authorities discovered a possible gravesite while searching Topaz Mountain, a desert area near Nephi that Joshua had frequented as a campsite. There were signs of recent soil disturbance and shoveling, but after digging a few feet down, police were unable to find any remains, in spite of careful sifting of the soil. Federal anthropologists also ruled out the possibility of the site being an ancient burial ground. Police continued to examine the site for a time, but offered no explanation as to why they previously announced the finding of remains when none had actually been confirmed. Authorities said they were following a scent detected by their sniffer dogs.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Relations between and within the Powell and Cox families became increasingly hostile. After a police raid in their home in 2011, both Joshua and Steven spoke to major news outlets regarding journals that Susan had allegedly written about the relationship between Steven and herself. Steven claimed that he and Susan had been falling in love prior to her disappearance, and he cited the content of the journals (written when Susan was a teenager) as evidence to support his theory that she was mentally unstable and could have run away with another man. A judge issued a permanent injunction forbidding Joshua and Steven from publishing any material from Susan's journals, ordering the pair to either return or destroy any journals already published.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: On September 22, Steven was arrested on charges of voyeurism and child pornography after police found evidence that he had secretly videotaped numerous women and young girls, including Susan. John Long, assistant attorney general for Washington State, said that Joshua was a "subject" in the child pornography investigation. A friend of Steven claimed that he was preoccupied with pornography and "was hung up on [Susan] sexually". Chuck Cox filed for custody of Susan's children the day after Steven was arrested. A Washington court eventually granted Cox temporary custody of the boys, ruling that Joshua would have to move out of Steven's home if he wanted to regain custody. Joshua rented a house in South Hill, but authorities later alleged that he had never actually moved into that house, merely making it appear as if he had satisfied the court's instructions while continuing to reside at Steven's home.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: In late September 2011, Joshua's sister Jennifer stated that she believed Joshua was "responsible for his wife Susan Powell's disappearance". His other sister Alina had also been suspicious of him as well; however, she later withdrew her suspicions and felt that Joshua had been unduly harassed by the investigation. By this time, West Valley City had spent more than half a million dollars on the case. On September 28, Mayor Mike Winder indicated that he felt that the case was worth the expense, stating, "We feel that we are getting to that tipping point where we have more hot evidence than we have had in the past two years", and that the case was moving forward.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: In late 2011, Joshua underwent a series of court-ordered evaluations in Washington. The evaluations by James Manley determined that Joshua had adequate parenting skills, a steady employment history and no criminal record or history of domestic violence. However, Manley also raised issues concerning the ongoing criminal investigations, Joshua's failure to admit normal personal shortcomings, his overbearing behavior with his sons, and his persistent defensiveness and paranoia (attributed to the police and media attention in conjunction with underlying narcissistic traits). The initial recommendation was for Joshua to have visitation with his sons several times a week, supervised by a social worker.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: In the last week of January 2012, Utah police discovered about 400 images of simulated child pornography, bestiality and incest on a computer seized from the Powell family home. The pornography had been cached when viewed by the previous owner of the computer, which had been purchased by Susan secondhand. However, Utah authorities misled the court and accused Joshua of having viewed the images. The images, while not illegal due to them being in a hand-drawn or cartoonish 3-D format, were cause for "great concern" to Manley, particularly given Joshua's earlier denial of possessing any such material. Joshua was recommended to receive a more thorough psychosexual evaluation and polygraph test, but Manley suggested no change in the visitation schedule with the Powell boys.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Meanwhile, Michael established a Google Sites page which claimed that Susan's parents were abusing and neglecting the boys in collusion with child welfare authorities, and that West Valley City police had both mishandled the investigation into Susan's disappearance and were harassing Joshua. Lawyers for the Cox family disputed the allegations and Google removed the site after a few days due to terms of use violations.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: On February 5, 2012, social worker Elizabeth Griffin Hall called 9-1-1 after taking Charlie and Braden to a supervised visit at Joshua's house in South Hill. Hall, who was supposed to monitor the visit between Joshua and the boys, reported that he grabbed them and would not let her through the door. Soon thereafter, the house exploded, killing Joshua and the two children. Local authorities treated the case as a double murder-suicide, saying that the act appeared to have been deliberate.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: When authorities notified Steven, who was in jail, he "didn't seem very upset by the news, but was angry towards authorities who notified him". Two weeks later, Steven invoked his Fifth Amendment right not to answer questions regarding Susan's disappearance. Cox and others have stated they believe that Steven knew what actually happened to Susan. Steven was convicted of voyeurism charges in May 2012 in a trial which largely skirted the issue of Susan's case.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: After a relatively brief investigation, officials confirmed that the explosion had been deliberately planned. The official cause of death for Joshua and the two boys was determined to be carbon monoxide poisoning, though the coroner also noted that both children had significant chopping injuries on the head and neck. A hatchet was recovered near Joshua's body, and investigators believe that he attacked the boys with it before being overwhelmed by smoke and fumes. The fire investigation also found two five-gallon cans of gasoline on the premises, as well as evidence that gasoline had been spread throughout the house.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Friends and relatives of Joshua told authorities that he had contacted them by email minutes before the incident to say goodbye. Some of them, including his local bishop, received instructions for finding his money and shutting off his utilities. Records also showed that Joshua had withdrawn $7,000 from his bank account and had donated his children's toys and books to local charities the day before the incident. Joshua named his brother Michael as the main beneficiary of his life insurance policy.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Charles and Braden are buried at Woodbine Cemetery, which also contains a memorial for their mother. Joshua's remains were cremated.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: On February 11, 2013, approximately one year after the death of Joshua and his sons, Michael killed himself in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where he had moved for graduate school. He jumped from the roof of a parking garage. Police had questioned Michael several times in 2012 after discovering his abandoned Ford at the Oregon wrecking yard; Michael was "evasive" about why he left the car at that location. Utah authorities have since said they believe that Joshua and Michael were accomplices in the murder of Susan.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: In a February 2013 interview, Manley, who had conducted the 2011–2012 evaluations of Joshua for Washington authorities, acknowledged his suspicions that Joshua was involved in his wife's disappearance. However, he did not mention these suspicions in his report because they were beyond the scope of his duties and because Joshua had not been charged with any wrongdoing.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: On May 21, 2013, West Valley City police announced that they had closed the active investigation into Susan's disappearance.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Joshua's sister, Jennifer, wrote a memoir with co-author Emily Clawson about the Powell family's tumultuous history. The memoir was published in June 2013 as "A Light In Dark Places". Jennifer was inspired to write the book, she says, "to help other people to recognize abuse in either their own relationships or relationships around them, because it's not always completely apparent."


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: In March 2015, Chuck Cox won a protracted court battle with Terrica and Alina Powell over control of Susan's estate. Terrica and Alina had sought to have Susan declared legally dead to collect life insurance, but Cox ultimately gained full control of the estate. The Cox family also sued Washington's Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) and its social workers, claiming that the agency prioritized Joshua's parental rights over the safety of the boys and facilitated their deaths. In 2015, a federal court granted summary judgement to the defendants, ruling that the social workers had immunity and DSHS was not negligent. In 2019, an appeals court partially overturned that decision, ruling that the social workers did have immunity but the question of DSHS's negligence could proceed to trial. At trial, a jury ruled that DSHS was negligent and awarded $98 million to the estates of Susan's two sons. Susan's family also pressured state lawmakers in Washington and Utah to pass bills that would restrict or block visitation rights for parents being investigated for murder.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Steven Powell was released from prison on July 11, 2017, after serving a total of seven years following his voyeurism and child pornography convictions. He died of natural causes in Tacoma, Washington, on July 23, 2018.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: In 2019, the "COLD podcast" disclosed that the "incestuous cartoon porn" found by Utah police was not Joshua's, nor even came from his computer. The pornographic pictures were found to be on a computer that actually belonged to Susan and that the pornography had been viewed by the computer's previous owners, fellow members of her LDS church, from whom she had purchased the used computer secondhand. Cold declined to identify the original owners of the computer because, as the host stated, he had a conflict of interest as an acquaintance of the previous owners of the computer as well as their shared membership in the LDS church. No criminal charges have been filed against anyone related to the images.


title: Disappearance of Susan Powell

text: Susan remains a missing person, but given the fates of her sons, it is widely believed that she was murdered by her husband Joshua. There were calls to have her declared dead, with the cause being homicide.