Tesla (TSLA) has to replace the ‘self-driving’ computer inside about 4 million vehicles or likely compensate the owners of those vehicles.
The liability could be more significant than the largest automotive recall in terms of cost.
In 2016, Tesla claimed that all its vehicles in production going forward have “all the hardware necessary for full self-driving capability.”
Tesla’s use of the term “full self-driving” has changed over the years, but at the time and for years later, CEO Elon Musk claimed that it would mean Tesla owners would eventually receive a software update that would turn their vehicles into “robotaxis” capable of level-4-5 self-driving, which means unsupervised autonomous driving even with no one in the cars.
Almost 10 years later, this has yet to happen and won’t happen soon in most of the cars Tesla has delivered over the last decade.
Archive link: https://archive.is/kJO23
Believe it ormnot: stock goes up
Lol, he isn’t going to do shit.
The only people he’s going to have to upgrade are those who purchased it. In the past there’s been some small claims court cases where someone won about being upgraded for a subscription, but if that is truly a concern, Tesla could stop the subscriptions for a few years and let the cars age out. They have no obligations to offer a subscription, it wasn’t a thing when the original promise was made.
Also, they only need to upgrade cars when it’d actually be capable. The promise is to upgrade cars to capable hardware, not upgrade cars with every hardware iteration, so as long as hw4 can’t actually do it, they’re likely in the clear as well.
Given most people don’t think they can actually make fsd work, then they’re in the clear.
If they somehow make it work, the upgrade cost is going to be peanuts compared to the insane amount of money they’d start printing.
So it’s not much if a story.
Edit: also worth mentioning, he’s been pretty clear over the years that FSD is going to cost a lot more money once it’s available for real. So if he does have to upgrade everyone who pays for it (lets assume they stop subscriptions to avoid that issue), even if that means upgrading all HW4 cars as well because it needs HW5, he can jack the price up more to help cover the upgrade cost. No one should be under the illusion that purchasing FSD will be cheaper than it is today if they succeed.
TLDR: the marketing lies about full self driving are problematic given the computers of the last few gens are only marginally more capable then a toaster. Some lawsuits have made Tesla pay up, many more might.
Opinion: do not let your car kill you. Do not use full self driving.
Full self driving isn’t full self driving anyway. You’re expected to sit in the drivers seat ready to take action anyway. Sucks that it kills people, but it’s a problem with the marketing, not the tech which is comparable to other cars adaptive cruise with lane keep assist. Musk should be held fully responsible because the fact that it’s a marketing issue makes it even worse to me.
Full self driving isn’t full self driving anyway.
Yeah, Elon is forever banned from the tautology club.
Don’t let your car kill other people, if your expensive deathtrap kills you I feel bad but I can’t say it’s unexpected.
I’ll take “things that might have happened if Elon didn’t cut the department that relates self-driving” for $100, Alex.
This is just one guy saying this. There’s no judge or government ordering a recall.
It’s clickbait.
Yep, my first thought on seeing this was … ‘and who will be enforcing this?’
No one, the answer is no one.
While the information about Elon’s history of making false claims, hardware and software details are accurate… there is no official body that has ruled as the title of the article suggests.
A more accurate headline would be ‘should’ not ‘has to’.
There is basically zero chance that this guy’s desire would be effectuated in the US … as the US agency that regulates cars… was recently gutted by Musk’s DOGE idiots.
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2025/04/car-safety-experts-at-nhtsa-which-regulates-tesla-axed-by-doge/
Maybe the EU or China or other governments could… legally agree with the author, and order a similar command…
But uh yeah, the Trump admin is currently blatantly telling the Supreme Court to go fuck themselves, the law will soon be whatever the hell Trump and his orbiters want it to be, has already told the entire world to go fuck themselves and also beg and grovel at the same time.
Elon would just… continue doing whatever the fuck he wants, even if another country mandated a recall/replacement.
Sorry, but uh yeah, we have a fascist government now, the rule of law is dead, the law is now whatever the fuck the Trump admin says it is.
That agency apparently creates new safety regulations but doesn’t do oversight. I think that’s up to the courts? Someone correct me if I’m wrong.
Technically, its complicated, but basically, NHTSA both sets the standards by which a manufacturer should assess whether or not to do a recall… and they also issue recalls themselves.
They do investigations, compile data, and if it looks like a certain make and or model has a serious flaw, they’ll issue a recall if the manufacturer hasn’t.
If they are gutted, specifically as they have been by Musk, well then there are no more people actually investigating self driving capabilities and onboard computers, there are no more updates to any of those policies, and nobody issues a recall for such a category of defective vehicle.
‘and who will be enforcing this?’
No one, as long as their CEO is President and dismantling all the organizations that were barely checking him in the first place.
Yeah, Musk got rid of the people who could actually tell him to do this.
Tesla: LOL our CEO owns the president.
That tends to happen when everything’s computer
As another user said, it’s just a random blogger that said this.
Musk quote:
I mean, I think the honest answer is that we’re going to have to upgrade people’s Hardware 3 computer for those that have bought full self-driving, and that is the honest answer and that’s going to be painful and difficult but we’ll get it done. Now I’m kind of glad that not that many people bought the FSD package.
Time to sell Tesla to xAI
At this point, I’m sure the plan is to let the HW3 cars age out before they could provide the upgrade. It worked on me, I sold my car a month ago without ever getting what I paid for. I look forward to joining the class action suit, but I doubt I’ll ever see a dime in compensation.
He is 100% gonna try and weasel out of this recall and paying compensation.
Elon Musk claimed that it would mean Tesla owners would eventually receive a software update that would turn their vehicles into “robotaxis” capable of level-4-5 self-driving
Wait… so he actually knows what the standard levels 4 and 5 are??
:-)
Maybe he asked his leveling guy from POE2?
Level 5 is easy to understand even for musk, it’s a fully autonomous robot that requires no human supervision or intervention yet is capable of navigating every single possible traffic situation. That’s what he has been claiming is just a few years away for over a decade.
And as long as he insists that the only sensors a tesla has are cameras, that goal is simply impossible, with cars driving under semi-truck trailers and through walls with pictures of the road painted on it.
Level 5 is easy to understand even for musk
Disagree.
He says “all” and he probably thinks “all”, but the meaning of it is always “nearly all”. I say, he is unable to grasp that the standard’s requirement actually includes all the rare conditions that happen in the real world.
Rain, snow, thunderstorm, earthquake, vomit on the dashboard, no internet…
That’s exactly it, he knows what it means - all. L5 is easy like that.
He’s delusional thinking that he could ever actually achieve that, but that’s why L5 is so much simpler of a concept than L4, as with L4 you can argue about semantics and details about what exactly it has to be able to do to qualify. Level 5 has no exceptions, it has to be completely autonomous with zero human interaction required other than telling it where you want to get to. If it can’t do it, it isn’t L5.
He knows the words.
Can’t tell you, that’s Level 6 classified. Sorry bud.
G-14
Gesundheit
It is always a stock market manipulation grift.
He knows how to repeat sounds now! That’s good.
One week before Tesla’s earning call too.
I love this for Muskrat.
That’s going to cost quite a bit, what with tariffs on electronics and all. Wait, I had a tissue around here somewhere…
Did you come as well?
It’s going to cost him nothing. Trump justs writes an executive order that the customers can go fuck themselves, and there’s that.
It is right next to the world’s tiniest violin
You forgot the third option, “Or ignore the courts.”
