Tesla Recalls 2 Million US Vehicles Due to Autopilot Defect

The leading multinational innovative electric car manufacturer led by Elon Musk is recalling over 2 million vehicles in the U.S. that have its Autopilot advanced driver-assistance feature integrated due to concerns highlighted by a safety regulator, reports Reuters.

An investigation by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) identified a large number of accidents over the past several years, which led the organization to determine that Autopilot does not meet the right safety criteria for full self-driving. These findings have led to the biggest recall for Tesla to date, as it applies to almost all of its vehicles on U.S. roads.

In August, acting NHTSA Administrator Ann Carlson said it’s “really important that driver monitoring systems take into account that humans over-trust technology,” according to The Times.

The Autopilot system was designed to allow cars to steer, accelerate, and brake within their lane without human control, and the enhanced Autopilot goes a step further and can help in changing lanes on highways, but it’s not independent. One feature of Autopilot is the Autosteer, which keeps a fixed speed or following distance and assists in keeping the car within lanes.

Tesla was in opposition to the NHTSA’s analysis but agreed to deploy an over-the-air software update that will “incorporate additional controls and alerts to those already existing on affected vehicles to further encourage the driver to adhere to their continuous driving responsibility whenever Autosteer is engaged.”

However, the company did not respond to a question on whether the recall would be implemented beyond the United States, so it’s not clear whether China will command a recall over the same issue.

The NHTSA set out to investigate Autopilot in August 2021 after spotting over a dozen crashes where Tesla cars hit stationary emergency vehicles, which then led to them upgrading the investigation in 2022. The NHTSA said that as a result of its investigation, Tesla issued the recall after the agency found that Tesla’s Autopilot system “can provide inadequate driver engagement and usage controls that can lead to foreseeable misuse.”

Within the investigation, the NHTSA analyzed 956 crashes where Autopilot was claimed to have been in action and focused on 322 crashes that involved Autopilot.

A law professor from the University of South Carolina who studies transportation issues, Bryant Walker Smith, explained that the software-only fix will be relatively limited. The recall “really seems to put so much responsibility on human drivers instead of a system that facilities such misuse.”

The NHTSA’s investigation into Autopilot will be kept open as it takes a deeper and further look into the capability of Tesla’s solutions. Tesla and the NHTSA had many discussions since mid-October to discuss the agency’s provisional conclusions on potential driver misuse and Tesla’s proposed software remedies in response.

The update, which is based on vehicle hardware, will involve more focus and attention on visual alerts on the user interface, more simple engagement and disengagement of Autosteer, and added checks when Autosteer is in use. They said the update will also include “eventual suspension from Autosteer use if the driver repeatedly fails to demonstrate continuous and sustained driving responsibility while the feature is engaged,” according to Barron’s.

However, they did not elaborate on how alerts and safeguards would change.