US seeks information from Tesla on how it developed and verified whether Autopilot recall worked
Federal safety investigators want Tesla to tell them how it developed the fix in a recall of more than 2 million vehicles with the company’s Autopilot partially automated driving system
DETROIT — Federal highway safety investigators want Tesla to tell them how and why it developed the fix in a recall of more than 2 million vehicles equipped with the company's Autopilot partially automated driving system.
Investigators with the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration have concerns about whether the recall remedy worked because Tesla has reported 20 crashes since the remedy was sent out as an online software update in December.
In a l etter to Tesla posted on the agency's website Tuesday, investigators wrote that they could not find a difference between warnings to the driver to pay attention before the recall and after the new software was sent out. The agency said it will evaluate whether driver warnings are adequate, especially when a driver-monitoring camera is covered.
The agency asked for volumes of information about how Tesla developed the fix, and zeroed in on how it used human behavior to test the recall effectiveness.
The 18-page letter asks how Tesla used human behavior science in designing Autopilot, and the company's assessment of the importance of evaluating human factors.
It also wants Tesla to identify every job involved in human behavior evaluation and the qualifications of the workers. And it asks Tesla to say whether the positions still exist.
A message was left by The Associated Press early Tuesday seeking comment from Tesla about the NHTSA letter.
Tesla is in the process of laying off about 10% of its workforce, about 14,000 people, in an effort to cut costs to deal with falling global
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