Tesla has three days to hand over self-driving vehicle data, or it will face the wrath of the US Government (or a transport-related branch of it anyway). The demand is part of an investigation into the estimated 2,882,566 Tesla vehicles equipped with FSD (Supervised) or FSD (Beta).<\/p>\n
Specifically, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) wants data related to traffic violations<\/a>, including vehicles running red lights, making illegal turns, and driving the wrong way. Which is oddly similar to what an anti-self-driving organization warned us all about in one of the wackiest Super Bowl commercials<\/a> of the last few years.<\/p>\n The driving system formerly known as FSD<\/a>, is rated as \u201cLevel-2.\u201d This means someone needs to be in the driver\u2019s seat and paying attention at all times. Technically, if the vehicle does something wrong, it\u2019s the driver\u2019s job to step in and most of the legal liability still falls on said driver.<\/p>\n With that being said, the NHTSA is investigating if these incidents occur in such a way that the driver could not reasonably react or intervene. Humans have reaction times, and can panic when something unexpected happens, after all. So if a Tesla did accelerate past a stop sign at the last second, or just swerve into the wrong lane on a whim, there\u2019s a chance the driver could not react fast enough to prevent a crash.<\/p>\n We also know that 58 incidents related to this issue were reported. This includes 23 injuries, from 14 crashes. There are no fatalities related to this issue on record.<\/p>\n Tesla has until March 9th to comply, but as Elon Musk likes having his day in court Tesla could continue to resist. Even without the lawyers doing their thing, there\u2019s a big question mark over the NHTSA\u2019s ability to effectively punish a company like Tesla for non-compliance in this and similar situations.<\/p>\nWhat happens if Tesla ignores the NHTSA\u2019s request?<\/h2>\n