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California Scraps Safety Driver Rules for Self-Driving Cars (nytimes.com) 200

Posted by msmash from the up-next dept.
California regulators have given the green light to truly driverless cars. From a report: The state's Department of Motor Vehicles said Monday that it was eliminating a requirement for autonomous vehicles to have a person in the driver's seat to take over in the event of an emergency. The new rule goes into effect on April 2. California has given 50 companies a license to test self-driving vehicles in the state. The new rules also require companies to be able to operate the vehicle remotely -- a bit like a flying military drone -- and communicate with law enforcement and other drivers when something goes wrong. The changes signal a step toward the wider deployment of autonomous vehicles. One of the main economic benefits praised by proponents of driverless vehicles is that they will not be limited by human boundaries and can do things like operate 24 hours in a row without a drop-off in alertness or attentiveness. Taking the human out of the front seat is an important psychological and logistical step before truly driverless cars can hit the road. "This is a major step forward for autonomous technology in California," said Jean Shiomoto, director of California's D.M.V. "Safety is our top concern and we are ready to begin working with manufacturers that are prepared to test fully driverless vehicles in California."
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California Scraps Safety Driver Rules for Self-Driving Cars More

California Scraps Safety Driver Rules for Self-Driving Cars

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  • video game with no liability farmed out to cheap remote works or just some kid who put $0.25 into a game at some arcade.

    • Maybe they can turn this into a captcha? "Prove you are not a robot: check all images of cars that are about to crash horribly"

  • Serious questions (Score:5, Interesting)

    by PopeRatzo ( 965947 ) on Tuesday February 27, 2018 @11:31AM (#56194443) Journal

    Should the owner of a self-driving car be required to have a driver's license? And if the owner is not required to have a driver's license, and he's not driving the vehicle, should he be required to have insurance? Shouldn't the manufacturer be the one insured against any liability if there is an accident?

    • and can you get a DUI in driverless car? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Joe_Dragon ( 2206452 ) on Tuesday February 27, 2018 @11:32AM (#56194453)

      and can you get a DUI in driverless car?

    • What? Owners of regular manually driver cars aren't required to have driver's licenses. (You only need a license to drive a car, not to own one.)

      • What? Owners of regular manually driver cars aren't required to have driver's licenses. (You only need a license to drive a car, not to own one.)

        OK, let me rephrase. Should the person who switches on the self-driving car and enters the destination and then gets into the car for the trip be required to have a driver's license, or should I just put you down as a "no"?

        • I'm in a 'no' for that category.

          "Should the person who boards an automated shuttle at the airport have an engineer's certification?"

          If you're not in charge of driving a vehicle, not expected to jump in in case of emergency, and don't need to interact with it other than pushing a couple of buttons to tell it where to go/stop, why would you need some certification that shows you're qualified to drive it?

          For this reason, I'm not really that upset to see CA get rid of the driver requirement. Humans suck at driv

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by mysidia ( 191772 )

          If these are the only tasks that they ever perform regarding the vehicle, then No.

          But we still might want to require even riders show they have a minimum of survival skills before they're allowed to direct a vehicle to a location; in order to be licensed as a "Safe rider" ---- that would include education in what to do in the event of a breakdown for their model of vehicle, and Rider safety rules such as Must buckle seatbelts.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mysidia ( 191772 )

        What? Owners of regular manually driver cars aren't required to have driver's licenses.

        That may be true if they don't drive the vehicle, but they're still required to have liability insurance that covers the vehicle in order to register the vehicle at the DMV and proof of insurance these days has to be shown every time you get inspection stickers updated --- one of the first things they ask you getting insurance on the vehicle is to see your driver's license.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by PPH ( 736903 )

          My DMV has never asked to see my insurance card. Only cops when I get pulled over. And it's not the car's insurance card they want to see. It's the one with my name on it (in the event I borrow a car).

          • Wow, just wow. In TX, you must show your insurance card for an inspection sticker. I also need to enclose a copy of my card when getting license plate renewal by mail. I assume in person you need to show the card. I think I had to show it to get my DL renewed too, but it has been awhile (6 year renewal cycle for DL) so not positive.

            • In CA we don't have inspection stickers. Inspections are also done only for emissions, and only every other year after the car is 6 years old. We don't care about functioning anything else, but boy, try to change out an intake or exhaust and there will be hell to pay!

              • Even more shocking. TX is more stringent on cars than CA. Inspection is annual, but a new car gets a sticker good for 2 years. I think they even test drive the car to verify everything works.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by PPH ( 736903 )

              Interesting. What do you do if your car is licensed/insured in another state?

              I ask this because we (in WA State) have a company that does utility contracting. And all of their vehicles are licensed in .... Texas*. I doubt these cars have ever actually been to Texas. They have local dealership stickers. So I wonder how they even get plates, renewals, inspections, etc.

              *Used to be Florida. But I think they had a rules change and the company just moved their fleet office to TX.

          • My DMV has never asked to see my insurance card.

            In Virginia, there's a checkbox on the vehicle registration application/renewal where you attest that you have the minimum acceptable insurance on the vehicle or will pay the uninsured vehicle fee.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by sl149q ( 1537343 )

          Your insurance company wants your license because they are insuring you driving your car.

          If you are not driving your car, then the insurance company that is insuring your self-driving car will want to know how reliable that brand of self-driving car is etc, but won't care about who the car is driving around.

          I think we can assume that the self-driving car manufacturers, insurance companies, and state regulators will sort this out long before you show up at the dealer to buy one and get it insured.

      • Re:Serious questions (Score:4, Informative)

        by Shotgun ( 30919 ) on Tuesday February 27, 2018 @02:30PM (#56195865)

        You're not even required to have a license to drive. The license is required to drive on public roads. Lots of kids driving farm trucks around the pastures.

    • Don't be absurd, computers can't make mistakes! Obviously they don't need a license or insurance, you just forfeit all your finnancial assets in a crash because you were sitting in it wrong. The company can't be blamed, it's not like a company could be considered a person and the individuals in it were just following orders. /s

      Im waiting on the first fatality in a so called self driving car that is a mistake a computer would make that almost no human would - that ought to really inspire early adoption o

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mysidia ( 191772 )

        An analogous example is the tesla crash where supposedly the color of the trailer too closely matched the sky

        Honestly... we should have a law that large vehicles must have sides that are Distinctly colored from the environment with bright "Blue" or "White" colors specifically banned, so they are visible at maximal range, even to a computer.

        • If it wasn't a problem before self-driving, then it's not reasonable to place that burden on everyone owning a truck just because someone decided to let these on the road. Seiously, I thought Slashdot was generally against regulations but this is a silly one.

      • A lot of the stupid questions that get asked about how computer-driven cars will operate assume that we should keep city infrastructure exactly the same. Maybe that's where we start, but that's definitely not where we should end up.

        When we ask questions like, "if the car is going to hit a family, and the only choices are to kill them or swerve into a concrete barrier and kill the driver," we need to wonder why the car had no line of sight to the family until the last second, and how it was able to be going

        • So if a computer draws a straighter line on its screen than I can draw on paper, you would conclude that it is the better artist?
          • People that think autonomous driving is easy and nearly solved, in serious development for less than 20 years, not only are completely unaware of the magnitude of the complexity involved, but are also unaware of the entirety of computer vision difficulties going back to the 80s. It's kind of insane when you think about it, navigating the world on shitty sensors with poor bandwidth and a million Rube Goldberg tweaks but doing it nearly flawlessly with no effort has pretty much been every mobile organism for
      • These vehicles aren't going to be making any moral choices; they will take reasonable action to try and avoid a serious crash. "Reasonable" in most cases will simply to apply the brake and keep the lane. "Reasonable" will not include taking any rash action where the outcome is unclear: swerving into oncoming traffic when there's no clear view of the road ahead, swerving into an adjacent lane when it's not clear if there is no other vehicle there, swerving onto the sidewalk or crashing into a lamp post to

    • Vehicles are required to have insurance, not people. The vehicle policy covers any authorized driver.

      • Vehicles are required to have insurance, not people.

        Vehicles are not liable for anything so no. It's the people who are insured, not the vehicle. You could say that the insurance "follows" the vehicle (in some cases) and in some policies the insurance follows the drive.

        If my vehicle is the one required to have insurance and not me, then let my goddamn car pay for its own policy.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by rsborg ( 111459 )

          Vehicles are required to have insurance, not people.

          Vehicles are not liable for anything so no. It's the people who are insured, not the vehicle. You could say that the insurance "follows" the vehicle (in some cases) and in some policies the insurance follows the drive.

          If my vehicle is the one required to have insurance and not me, then let my goddamn car pay for its own policy.

          If you're being specific, what is covered for insurance is actually the *relationship* between the driver(s) and the vehicle(s). There is assumed insurance for incidental drivers. If you add a person to your plan, they are associated with one ore more vehicles.

          • If you add a person to your plan, they are associated with one ore more vehicles.

            When our daughter was still on our insurance, she was covered for anything she drove.

          • Some policies have no named insureds.

            Auto insurance is written on a particular vehicle or vehicles, named insureds can be on the policy or not.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by PPH ( 736903 )

        That's odd. In my state, I carry an insurance policy. I can borrow or rent a car and still be covered.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by bws111 ( 1216812 )

          Only because your insurance policy allows it. Insurance is against the vehicle, not the driver. If you have more than one car you need more than one policy, even if there is only one driver.

    • I don't think the owner's going to get out of insurance in the current scheme of things. Suing the manufacture is just too hard, folks will want to go after an owner/insurance company.

      Now, what I'd _like_ to see is the main reason for mandatory car insurance go away: the absurd high cost of medical treatment following an accident. If we could get the US on single payer healthcare then the only thing left would be pain & suffering and car repair. p&s payouts can be huge but only in pretty rare ca
      • In that situation, going after the insurance company is what is supposed to happen. If the insurance company feels they shouldn't be covering the incident due to system failure, then they would go after the manufacturer.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sloth jr ( 88200 )
      No driver's license required; insurance is definitely required in the same way that you must carry liability insurance on your house.

      • No driver's license required; insurance is definitely required in the same way that you must carry liability insurance on your house.

        There is no law or requirement that homeowners have liability insurance. If you have a mortgage, your lender may require it, but if you own a home outright, you don't have to carry liability insurance.

    • Who is responsible for vehicle maintenance and sensor/control upkeep? People already fail to maintain their vehicles now, self-driving cars aren't going to change that -- people are still going to get flat tires, overheating radiators, gunk on the their LiDAR, etc.

      Right now, most companies (e.g. Waymo, Uber) are focusing on the service model -- precisely to internalize the process of maintenance (especially while the technology is beta) -- so they would logically be the ones to pay for insurance.

      • Right now, most companies (e.g. Waymo, Uber) are focusing on the service model -- precisely to internalize the process of maintenance (especially while the technology is beta) -- so they would logically be the ones to pay for insurance.

        But those are cars for hire. Do you think there will no longer be private ownership of autonomous vehicles? I suppose it could happen, but I don't see it.

        Maybe it'll be like a game console or iPhone, that you don't actually own, you are just granted a license.

  • what happens when the signal is lost? lags out? someone get's hit with high roaming fees say video at 2.5-5 meg per camera over 5-10+ of them?

  • Why wait for April 2, when April 1 would be so much more appropriate?

    • While I get the joke, April 1 is on a Sunday, so they probably went for the closest business day. Whether or not that was necessary for this is another discussion entirely.

  • "Safety is our top concern and we are ready to begin working with manufacturers that are prepared to test fully driverless vehicles in California."

    With the elimination of the human safety net behind the wheel, safety is about as much of a top concern as security is in the IoT market.

    And speaking of IoT, can you say rush-to-market-capitalistic-greed? It's not too fucking hard to paint the picture as to where autonomous solutions are going and how fast.

    You do you, California. Good luck with your beta testing. Hope it doesn't get too bloody.

    • That's a nice emotional outburst you have there, but it doesn't match the facts. Facts are that there is no "human safety net behind the wheel" most of the time.

      If you look at fatalities per mile driven, automatic cars are safer.

      If you look at the occurance of accidents due to distracted driving, they are going up rather than down.

      As much as it makes you uncomfortable and unhappy, this is not a net negative in terms of safety.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by sloth jr ( 88200 )
        I'm really conflicted about this. On the one hand, it seems likely that for 80% of road conditions encountered, an autonomous car might do a better job than humans, though from a utility perspective, I have serious doubts that I could use my automated car to take me up a BLM dirt road, or drive in Montana white-outs. Testing's happening mostly in the Bay Area and Phoenix, both of which have, not no weather, but little severe weather except a few seasonal rainstorms (duststorms?).

        On the other hand, I do beli

        • So, maybe automated cars aren't going to work for BLM dirt roads or blizzards. It doesn't mean they don't have a place, and can't replace a lot of the cars on the road.

          We really are new at the self-driving thing at this point. And it's already better than a lot of drivers in a lot of situations. I think we're on the exponential upswing in self-driving tech, and not at any sort of plateau. The amount of money and engineering that's being poured into it now is already rapidly producing results, and will conti

      • That's a nice emotional outburst you have there, but it doesn't match the facts. Facts are that there is no "human safety net behind the wheel" most of the time.

        If you look at fatalities per mile driven, automatic cars are safer.

        If you look at the occurance of accidents due to distracted driving, they are going up rather than down.

        As much as it makes you uncomfortable and unhappy, this is not a net negative in terms of safety.

        Let me clarify my concerns, in priority order:

        #1: The security of the autonomous network that all vehicles will likely use.

        #2: The amount of damage one can incite if the equivalent of a DDoS attack was ever done on an autonomous network.

        #3: The ability to paralyze an entire economy with such an attack in a future that is completely dependent on autonomous transport. (Consider this in the future; one good attack that kills 10,000 people would likely be enough to incite mass fear across a society that doesn'

        • Wow, you have a really dystopian world-view. So because bad things could theoretically happen in the future, you're against....everything? All technological progress?

          Because all of these things are equally applicable to the stock market, banking system, online commerce, IOT, cell network, etc.

          While I don't disagree about the problems that could happen, I fail to see a situation where "Hackers murdering 20,000 people per year in the future" is a real possibility. That's not how any company stays in business.

  • At the end of the XIX century, motor vehicles were initially allowed on the road only if preceded by a person (on foot) waving a red flag to warn pedestrians. I bet we already have rules in place, concerning autonomous vehicles, that will elicit condescending, amused smiles from our descendants in a few decades.

  • "Safety is our top concern" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by JustNiz ( 692889 ) on Tuesday February 27, 2018 @12:21PM (#56194837)

    I'm amazed she could even keep a straight face when she said that.
    She immediately followed up with:
    "One of the main economic benefits praised by proponents of driverless vehicles..."
    ah ha. NOW we're getting to why this legislation passed.

  • When they're removing an active driver as a failsafe?

    Just rename these fucking things to "Suicide Booths".

    • Exactly how frequently do you think that humans stop automated cars in order to prevent a fatal accident?

      I'm aware of exactly 0 times that this has happened.

      I'm also aware of several occurrences where human drivers failed to stop automated cars from getting into fatal accidents.

      So what's the point of a driver? Especially given that automated cars are safer than human drivers?

      • I'm also aware of several occurrences where human drivers failed to stop automated cars from getting into fatal accidents.

        Clearly if it is the case that the accident wouldn't have happened were the human driving in the first place, then humans are fools for trusting self driving. The driver isn't necessarily bad in this case, it is just as likely that control was passed back at an unreasonable time.

        • Clearly if it is the case that the accident wouldn't have happened were the human driving in the first place, then humans are fools for trusting self driving.

          That's a rather obvious failure in logic, and I'm surprised you didn't notice it before hitting submit.

          Single accidents aren't things you can base policy decisions on. If they were, we'd have no large ocean liners (Titanic), no planes, and obviously no cars.

          What you can sensibly base policy and decisions on are the aggregate rates of accidents. If autonomous driving cars cause more accidents on the whole than self driving, I agree, it's somewhat foolish to trust self-driving cars. But if they do not, then i

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Chas ( 5144 )

        #Citation needed#

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AHuxley ( 892839 )
      The safety of bringing a new tax on new "cars" to their state.
      Attracting that new car investment in a safe way is the gov top concern.
      Just like the film industry was attracted to move to the west of the USA.
  • I'm worried more about the other drivers that expect a car on the road to do a certain thing, but then it does a totally different thing because the AI isn't flexible enough to think like a human. In the case of the truck backing up in Las Vegas incident. Yes, it was the truck driver's fault, but most truck drivers probably do the same thing all the time, but because you have an AI behind you that is basically an idiot, now all of a sudden it's a problem and it's you're fault too. I really have to feel f

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