The Fed's Investigation Into Tesla's FSD Is Escalating

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has escalated an investigation into Tesla's Full Self-Driving (FSD) software. The probe is looking into how the software functions in adverse weather conditions like heavy precipitation, fog, and harsh sunlight. The NHTSA calls these "reduced roadway visibility conditions."

The investigation spans back to last year, which covers around 3.2 million of Tesla's vehicles, including the Model S, X, Y, and 3 EVs. The Cybertruck is also part of the investigation. The reason for the investigation, in the Administration's own words, is that FSD-equipped vehicles may fail “to detect and/or warn the driver appropriately under degraded visibility conditions such as glare and airborne obscurants.” Another potential issue is response times. The NHTSA's report says that it is evaluating the system's ability to notify drivers with enough advance notice for them to quickly respond and react to an obstruction.

At the NHTSA, the investigation began with Tesla's transition away from sensors in its advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) to an exclusively camera-run setup. The transition led to crashes and a fatality. Tesla's subsequent updates to the system are also at issue, according to filings: "Tesla’s post-incident analysis indicated that the update to the degradation detection system, had it been installed on the vehicles at the time, may have affected 3 of the 9 incidents identified" by the NHTSA.

The NHTSA's escalation seeks to further investigate Tesla's responses to crashes and the updates to its detection systems. It will attempt to "gather further information on the updated degradation detection system, including the status of updating vehicles and scope of compatible vehicles, the system’s visibility degradation detection capability, and alerts or warnings to the driver." Further investigation will also include analysis of six further incidents that could potentially be related.

Tesla and other companies' pushes towards autonomy have continually yielded accidents and, in some cases, fatalities. Like human drivers, the systems can make a mistake or an overcorrection. However, unlike human drivers, assigning blame and liability is not so easy. Who is to be liable when a Tesla using FSD, with a driver at the wheel, injures a cyclist at an intersection? The driver? Tesla? Both? Right now, legislators are trying to wade through this new legal grey area that has emerged with the continued use of autonomous driving systems and self-driving vehicles, both those with and without a driver to fall back on in the event of an accident.