There was an incident in China with Tesla’s FSD autonomous driving system (it’s called Full Self-Driving even though it doesn’t allow full autonomy), and the most bizarre thing in the whole story is that the case was broadcast live on the social network Douyin, the local version of TikTok. The driver of the Tesla Model 3 was broadcasting the drive in order to demonstrate the capabilities of the Tesla autonomous system, so he left it to him to drive the vehicle independently and recorded everything.
In an ironic twist of fate, not long after, the Model 3 autonomously moved into the adjacent lane and ran into a vehicle coming from the opposite direction. All this was seen by the users of the social network, and you can see it below.
Tesla launched its Level 2 driver assistance system in China earlier this year, but local regulators soon forced the company to change the system’s name because they felt it did not reflect the technology’s true capabilities. As we can see, they were right. Although Tesla advertises it as FSD, the system still requires constant driver supervision.
After the incident, questions arose about whether the FSD system was actually active at the time of the crash. The original live broadcast was not widely watched, and the driver initially did not want to release the footage of the accident itself, claiming that he was seeking direct compensation from Tesla. However, he subsequently posted a video that went viral on social media. It clearly shows that the system was active and that it initiated the realignment in the wrong direction.
An interesting aspect of the story is the spread of misinformation after the accident, in which Grok also participated. chatbot the same owner, Elon Musk. The artificial intelligence falsely claimed that the crash was “staged” and that the driver was operating the vehicle manually, despite evidence to the contrary. Tesla regularly points out that they are not responsible for the actions of the autonomous driving system, and the driver eventually published a video that. Fortunately, none of the participants in this accident suffered serious injuries.