What's the technology behind googles new features?

like ups tracking, Vehicle ID numbers etc

[musicales]

There's a whole host of new feature recently on Google like searching for Vehicle ID (VIN) numbers, e.g. JH4NA1157MT001832 [google.com], links to a CARFAX report on what kind of car and its status; UPC codes and so on.

My question is, what is the technology Google are using to understand that such and such a collection of letters is a VIN number for example? Is this applied semantics stuff, or something else?

Can anyone explain the approx technique involved?

[Brett_Tabke]

There is a system in place for naming VIN numbers. It is rather easy to id a number as a VIN or not.

[vin-number-check.com...]