Photo: Tesla
Carmakers are embroiled in a war to crack self-driving, with Tesla arguably further ahead in the game. Nevertheless, FBI director Chris Wray sees autonomous vehicles as a threat, opening up new ways for terrorists to harm Americans. FBI director expressed his concerns during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Autonomous driving is expected to bring us safer roads, virtually eliminating car crashes. If done right, self-driving should make driving errors a thing of the past, with all the benefits arising from this. It could also enable the elderly to remain mobile even when their medical conditions would not allow them to drive. Some go even further and predict an era when autonomous vehicles earn money for their owners instead of gathering dust in the garage. Everything is possible, which is why all carmakers are frantically developing autonomous-driving software.
Tesla started this game a little earlier than others and accumulated substantially more miles driven autonomously than everybody else. This was achieved while some people have paid a steep price in the name of science. Tesla’s Full Self-Driving software has often been criticized for giving people the false impression that it can drive the car autonomously. However, drivers need to agree to a long list of disclaimers before they are allowed to test the FSD Beta software.
Tesla claims its automated driving systems increase road safety, although the public perception of the FSD software is somehow mixed. It doesn’t help that Tesla gets a lot of media attention whenever one of its cars is involved in a crash. Recently, an 8-vehicle pileup on the Bay Bridge in San Francisco was caused by a Tesla Model S braking for no reason in the left lane. The investigation has revealed that the FSD software was in charge at the time of the crash. This has emphasized the limitations of today’s self-driving systems, which can make costly mistakes, just like humans do.
Nevertheless, self-driving cars may pose bigger risks than causing a crash. If we’re to listen to FBI’s director Chris Wray, autonomous vehicles can be a threat to national security. Wray sees autonomous vehicles as a tool to cause physical harm and a valuable source of personal data that could become a target. Wray spoke about these threats at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
“When you talk about autonomous vehicles, it’s obviously something that we’re excited about, just like everybody,” Wray said. “But there are harms that we have to guard against that are more than just the obvious. One of them is the danger that there could be ways to confuse or distort the algorithms to cause physical harm. A different kind of harm we’re concerned about is the enormous amount of data that autonomous vehicles, for example, aggregate. And any time you aggregate lots and lots of sensitive data, it makes a very tempting target.”
The FBI director is particularly concerned with China’s growing Artificial Intelligence program. The country also has “a bigger hacking program than any other nation in the world.” True as it might be, Wray’s job is to be concerned about such matters, even when they are not an immediate threat. Hopefully, autonomous-driving vehicles will prove a boon to humanity instead of a threat.
Tesla started this game a little earlier than others and accumulated substantially more miles driven autonomously than everybody else. This was achieved while some people have paid a steep price in the name of science. Tesla’s Full Self-Driving software has often been criticized for giving people the false impression that it can drive the car autonomously. However, drivers need to agree to a long list of disclaimers before they are allowed to test the FSD Beta software.
Tesla claims its automated driving systems increase road safety, although the public perception of the FSD software is somehow mixed. It doesn’t help that Tesla gets a lot of media attention whenever one of its cars is involved in a crash. Recently, an 8-vehicle pileup on the Bay Bridge in San Francisco was caused by a Tesla Model S braking for no reason in the left lane. The investigation has revealed that the FSD software was in charge at the time of the crash. This has emphasized the limitations of today’s self-driving systems, which can make costly mistakes, just like humans do.
Nevertheless, self-driving cars may pose bigger risks than causing a crash. If we’re to listen to FBI’s director Chris Wray, autonomous vehicles can be a threat to national security. Wray sees autonomous vehicles as a tool to cause physical harm and a valuable source of personal data that could become a target. Wray spoke about these threats at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
“When you talk about autonomous vehicles, it’s obviously something that we’re excited about, just like everybody,” Wray said. “But there are harms that we have to guard against that are more than just the obvious. One of them is the danger that there could be ways to confuse or distort the algorithms to cause physical harm. A different kind of harm we’re concerned about is the enormous amount of data that autonomous vehicles, for example, aggregate. And any time you aggregate lots and lots of sensitive data, it makes a very tempting target.”
The FBI director is particularly concerned with China’s growing Artificial Intelligence program. The country also has “a bigger hacking program than any other nation in the world.” True as it might be, Wray’s job is to be concerned about such matters, even when they are not an immediate threat. Hopefully, autonomous-driving vehicles will prove a boon to humanity instead of a threat.
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