The Tesla Autopilot video was staged, exec admits in court

18 January 2023

That famous video where we see Tesla Model X leave the garage, pick up its driver and then embark on a cross-town journey without any input from the person behind the wheel - it’s fake. The rumors were swirling around for as long as the video has been out, but now the engineer involved in the project confirmed it in the court.

It’s not a new testimony either, which actually makes things even worse for Tesla. Ashok Elluswamy was the director of the Autopilot project at the time and made a sworn testimony to court during a lawsuit against Tesla for a 2018 fatal crash where a former Apple engineer lost his life.

Full Self-Driving Hardware on All Teslas from Tesla on Vimeo.

The testimony details how the video was recorded and confirms that the end result the world was presented was forged. Tesla used a predestined route that was 3D mapped and fed to the vehicle, test drivers had to intervene many times during turns and when the Tesla Model X was sent on its own to find parking space - it crashed into a fence.

According to Elluswamy, the intention of the video was to show what the system could be capable of in a future, not what it can do at the time. It seems Elon Musk missed that memo, as soon as the video was ready he released it to millions of his followers with a comment: “Tesla drives itself - no human input at all - through urban streets to highway to streets, then finds a parking spot.”

It’s one thing being excited about the technology, and quite another misleading the public on what the tech really can do. Tesla is still using that video to showcase capability of its autonomous driving systems and many people still blindly trust the company to take them safely to their destination.

There is no argument that in many cases Tesla’s software can perform better and quicker than a human can. There is no question that autonomous driving can make our lives easier, and hopefully safer. The issue is with the claims that were made, we can blame the public for blindly trusting Elon and being daft, but we shouldn’t excuse Tesla for misleading its customers.

The reports of the video being fake go back as far as 2021, when the New York Times was first to report on that. That’s when the rumors of the 3D mapped route surfaced first and that’s when we heard for the first time that the test vehicle crashed during the video recording.

Only now the testimony of Elluswamy has surfaced, he was deposed in a lawsuit that the family of Walter Huang filed against Tesla. The Apple engineer died in the crash in 2018 when he was driving his Tesla with Autopilot engaged. NTSB concluded its investigation of the crash and said that Tesla’s software limitations and lacking driver monitoring was a contributor to the accident.

Tesla is under criminal investigation by the DoJ for its autonomous driving claims. There’s a case in California where Tesla and its autonomous software is being looked at closely - the driver is accused of manslaughter but he blames Autopilot. Another lawsuit is being prepared in Florida and that one is against Tesla and Autopilot. NHTSA is conducting its own investigation and so is California’s DMV. Then there is the class action involving FSD and Autopilot. Tesla’s lawyers will be clocking some extra hours this year.

Via