A method for storing vehicle diagnostic data includes the steps of: reading one or more messages including vehicle diagnostic data; transmitting the read messages to a buffer memory; transmitting the read messages to an aggregation component; aggregating the read messages by use of the aggregation component to form an aggregated message; transmitting the aggregated message to the buffer memory; checking whether a predefined fault event occurred during aggregation of the messages; if a predefined fault event occurred: transmitting the predefined fault event to an extraction component, the predefined fault event including at least one predefined rule; executing the at least one predefined rule by the extraction component in order to extract the messages corresponding to the at least one predefined rule from the buffer memory; and storing the extracted messages and the fault event in a data memory, such that the extracted messages can be identified using the fault event.