Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

https://tiremeetsroad.com/2021/03/18/tesla-allegedly-remotely-unlocks-model-3-owners-car-uses-smart-summon-to-help-repo-agent/

by donohoe • 5 years ago

292 365 5 years ago

tiremeetsroad.com

causi• 5 years ago

Should this be illegal? No, probably not. Is this the future I want to live in? Also no.

stevewodil• 5 years ago

Seriously, they chase down normal cars for repossession I don’t feel strongly that this is all that different than it getting towed from your driveway.

Would I be really annoyed if it was my car? Yeah, but at the same time it’s up for repo either way.

We already knew that Tesla HQ can control the cars for service and such

greenshackle2• 5 years ago

Not only that, some lots that sell to high risk buyers (e.g. buy here pay here) already install GPS devices on their cars:

https://passtimegps.com/industries/bhph/

ahoka• 5 years ago

Yes, it should be. You pay extra in your fees to cover the possible loss of the entity giving you a loan, but they want the extra and not having to deal with the possible loss. They should just suck it up TBH.

_Microft• 5 years ago

Is this the future I want to live in?

For me neither. As much as I admire Musk for being the driving force behind the progress that his companies are making for electric mobility and especially space launch but a guy who fetishizes a dystopian cyberpunk future and works on hooking up brains to computers might have slightly different vision for the future than you and me.

ryanmercer2• 5 years ago

It's already the future you live in.

Repo agents, for decades, will roll up on a vehicle and hook it up to a tow truck and take off. People go out of their way to hide their vehicles, or block them in with other vehicles, when they haven't paid their loan and know their vehicle is now eligible for repossession.

This just makes it safer for the repo agents, because they can recover the vehicle faster and don't have to risk some nutjob running out of a house/apartment/office with a bat/gun/knife trying to confront them because someone was like "Dave, someone's hooking your car up to a tow truck".

dylan6045• 5 years ago

Is this the future I want to live in? Also no.

No need to fret the future my friend. The future is now. This dystopian future people keep fearing is happening now. It is the present reality.

gretch2• 5 years ago

No it’s really not. This is hyperbole.

Things are literally better now than ever before. More access to food, healthcare, and literacy on average for everyone in the world. More protection of basic human rights on average for everyone in the world.

If now is the dystopian future, when in the past would you like to time travel to? Before or after polio vaccine? Gay rights? Before/after Abolition of slavery (in select countries)?

aneutron4• 5 years ago

While this is an "interesting" story, I'd love to get some verification on it.

It sounds plausible, but almost illegal ? I'm in EU so don't know how really things work over there, but I would assume Tesla would need a judicial order siding with the bank to be able to do this ? I mean it's probably not the wild west over there. Or is it ?

k8sToGo2• 5 years ago

We do not have Repo in EU like they do in the US.

chrisseaton2• 5 years ago

Are you sure about that? I thought repossession of collateral from a defaulted loan is a basic part of cultures with both common and code law.

https://www.frenchentree.com/french-property/law/so-you-cant...

What happens if you don't pay your mortgage where you live?

tonyedgecombe3• 5 years ago

This doesn't fall under the remit of the EU.

chippiewill• 5 years ago

I think the mention of a bank is misleading. I think in this case the owner organised finance with Tesla directly. When he failed to pay Tesla on time they repo'd the car themselves.

aneutron4• 5 years ago

That would make much more sense.

mijoharas2• 5 years ago

Ahhhhh. This does make a lot more sense.

ec109685• 5 years ago

Tesla loans are through a bank, but I think they use their own financing arm for leases, so perhaps this was a delinquent lease.

Ekaros• 5 years ago

I suppose it really depends on exact legal contract. Is the financing that is loan against the vehicle and it is owned by the user. Or is it essentially rented.

And in first case even with court order there is good question about other creditors...

aneutron4• 5 years ago

While potentially completely unrelated, I've seen how "cowboy-like" the whole bounty hunters situation is over there, so it honestly and unfortunately wouldn't surprise me as much if it were the case with the creditors ...

jcims3• 5 years ago

(probably wrong statement follows) In the US, title to the vehicle usually remains in the hands of the creditor until it’s paid off.

matwood• 5 years ago

It's not even that interesting. Owner doesn't pay bill on an item being used as collateral. Said item is repossessed.

I hope the repo person realizes the future will need that type of job less and less.

Joker_vD2• 5 years ago

Nope, it won't. Ask anyone who ever lent money and they'll tell you that lending is actually the easiest part, now getting repaid is where most of the work goes into. Heck, you probably yourself can remember an acquaintance of yours who once borrowed figurative $20 from you and never returned them.

ghusto• 5 years ago

I think the surprise or even incredulity people over here in the EU have is not to do with "You don't pay for your stuff, we take the stuff back" (I think we're all familiar with the concept of paying for things), it's to do with how the seller remotely took actions on the item.

It's a bit like not keeping up your mortgage repayments, and the bank remotely locking you out (or in?) your house — except it's a bit worse, because the mortgage provider wouldn't have to use GPS to track where you and your house are. Perhaps that's not a shocking idea in the USA, but I think it is in the EU. I'm not for or against, just explaining where the shock factor is coming from here.

Now for my own opinion: The header here shouldn't be "Make sure you keep up your repayments", it should be "Don't buy stupid shit you don't need, can't afford, and is controlled by someone else".

msh2• 5 years ago

A lot of law enforcement is privatized in the USA so a lot of things that would be very illegal in most EU countries is ok there (fx bounty hunters)

adventured3• 5 years ago

Bounty hunters are uncommon in the US and very little of the law enforcement system is privatized in the US. It's in fact rare compared to the number of government law enforcement officers we have (local cops, county cops, state cops, federal cops, prison & jail cops, specialized, etc).

Having eg a private security guy working at your grocery store is not privatized law enforcement. That's the equivalent of a bar bouncer watching the property, not the equivalent of law enforcement and they don't have the legal powers of law enforcement either.

parsimo2010• 5 years ago

In the US this is legal. Banks are authorized to repossess property if you’re late on a payment^. Private companies are allowed to participate in repossession as long as they don’t break any other laws. Tesla didn’t break into the owner’s house to steal their passwords or keys, they didn’t assault the owner. All they did was take his car. They verified that they were taking the correct car. Since the repossession was being carried out on behalf of a bank, there was no theft. This is completely legal. If you don’t want a car company to assist a bank with repossession, don’t get a car with remote access features- which pretty much means an old car.

^There are rules on how late you have to be though- it’s not like they are taking your car after you’re 1 day late for the first time. The required amount of lateness depends on the state. And they are only allowed to take property that was used to secure the loan. In the case of a car loan that is usually the car itself.

aneutron4• 5 years ago

Thanks very much for the answer. I assumed that it would have to go through the judiciary, but I am surprised to see it's not the case.

It does make sense, especially if it's not abusive (e.g. one month behind equals reposession)

mijoharas2• 5 years ago

Private companies are allowed to participate in repossession as long as they don’t break any other laws.

Why do they do this? Did the bank pay Tesla to do so? (I'm sure there must be some incentive system here).

mFixman• 5 years ago

This is a report based on a Facebook post by a random person telling a story about her repo friend who once told her that Tesla could help him get control of the car.

Until someone reports this happening first hand, I'm going to assume that either a lot of details are missing or that the story is straight-up fake.

lotsofpulp2• 5 years ago

There are far too many articles or tweets or stories they get traction with zero attempt at verification. I do not understand why people upvote it.

zajio1am• 5 years ago

I'm in EU so don't know how really things work over there, but I would assume Tesla would need a judicial order siding with the bank to be able to do this ?

If a car was used as collateral for a loan, then bank would need a judicial order. But common way to buy a new car is leasing, where the car is owned by the leasing company during the period of the contract. If the contract says that lease is terminated when payments are not done, then i do not see why would leasing company need judicial order, when it is legal owner of the car (unless there is a specific legislation related to such kind of leases).

dfxm12• 5 years ago

Yeah, it's weird how a random Facebook post with no evidence is the basis for this story. It's one thing if your aunt believes it. It's another if some content farm posts it as fact. It's quite embarrassing to see such an article on the front page here though.

It's probably possible, and dealerships usually work with repo men/banks, but the point is, the article certainly did nothing to verify anything.

rvz3• 5 years ago

Unsurprising and seen here: [0] A text book definition of a backdoor.

It is still not your car. It is still Tesla's.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26512855

jcims3• 5 years ago

Ford Pass has the same capability. With self park it could even back out of a spot.

knorker5• 5 years ago

No, if you don't pay for it then it's the bank's car.

It's like saying "the super stole my TV!!" when actually the super just let the police in with a search warrant, and they took the TV you stole down to the station.

rvz3• 5 years ago

Tesla still has remote access to the cars its has sold and can unlock them if the authorities request them to do so. If that is not a backdoor I don't know what is.

Evidently, the car isn't yours, even though you have paid for it. Tesla still owns it.

RcouF1uZ4gsC• 5 years ago

When reading the tweet, I get the feeling that it is satire (kind of like the Onion).

I am not aware that Tesla is directly financing the vehicles, so why would they hire a repo person to go repossess it? In addition, given the OTA update capabilities of Tesla, they could probably just remotely disable the car, and not have to worry about the expense of liability of a repo agent. In addition, the picture is weird, as if you had such full control of the car, why would you need to put a "boot" on the car to immobilize it, since it would make driving it back to Tesla harder.

I am calling satire on the tweet, until further proof.

cheschire• 5 years ago

Indeed, Tesla’s own lending page seems to point to banks as lenders, not Tesla or a Tesla finance company. Perhaps I’m misunderstanding though, I’ve never looked deeply into this before.

https://www.tesla.com/support/lending#additional-support

Jaruzel• 5 years ago

The main issue here I guess, is Tesla assisting the bailiffs. Bailiffs (here in the UK) have certain legal rights to enter and repossess your house and/or remove property you haven't fully paid for. They are granted this right via a case-by-case court order.

If Telsa are also granted the rights within the court order to assist the bailiffs, then presumably it would be a fully legal action.

At the end of the day, you sign a contract wherein you agree to keep up payments on an item, and if you don't the item will be repossessed. If you don't like those terms, don't get stuff on payment plans.

staticassertion3• 5 years ago

I agree, though I think that ideally companies are advocates for their customers. For example, companies have to turn information over to courts, but they can push back on some, and publish transparency reports for others. Yes, they have to comply with the law, but imo a company has an obligation to advocate for their customers.

scoopertrooper• 5 years ago

Well, technically, the bank owns the car till you pay it off. So, maybe they are advocating for their customers?

netcan2• 5 years ago

To take a contradicting pov... I think this sort of expectation/ideal has done us more harm than helped.

As advocates, companies are fickle and unreliable.

Presenting as advocates, companies always stress how aligned their interests are with customers'. We'll, that's true until it isn't. Once it isn't, it flips.

That's useless. Better to keep in mind that companies aren't your advocates. They're your salesman.

simonh4• 5 years ago

Tesla were helping the legal owner of one of their vehicles take possession of it. If you were the legal owner, wouldn't you want that?

Joker_vD2• 5 years ago

If Telsa are also granted the rights within the court order to assist the bailiffs

From what limited knowledge of law enforcement I have (and it's very little, I admit), it's reversed: everyone by default is legally obliged to assist a law officer, on their request, to enforce the law and order; there are some limits beyond which explicit court orders are required, but those limits are rather broad.

junon• 5 years ago

This is an assumption based on current events and climate toward LEOs and is very far from the truth. There are very clear boundaries for assisting with law enforcement. Warrants are not magical documents that allow anything to happen.

kwhitefoot• 5 years ago

everyone by default is legally obliged to assist a law officer,

Are bailiffs law officers in that sense?

Retric4• 5 years ago

Most US car dealerships will make a new key for someone repossessing a car. As Tesla is the dealership this seems like the exact same situation, the only difference is someone with the key can now remote summon the car.

chrisseaton2• 5 years ago

someone with the key can now remote summon the car

Cars with remote summons features today basically just crawl forward a few metres to help you get out of a parking spot. They aren't self-driving across town to a repossession lot, if that's what you're thinking.

throwawayboise2• 5 years ago

I could see that if they are holding the financing. If the car is financed by a third party, I cannot imagine why the dealer would want or care to get involved.

Ajedi324• 5 years ago

The "main issue" is that Tesla is even able to assist the bailiffs in this manner.

If a remote party can, by design, lock you out of your car and take control of it without your consent, do you even really own the vehicle in the first place?

Others have argued "well, you don't own the car, the bank does", but unless Tesla is somehow unable to do this with cars not owned by a lienholder, that's kinda beside the point as far as I'm concerned.

mikeryan3• 5 years ago

In the US a financed car is “owned” by the bank until fully paid off - which most of the time is a subsidiary of the manufacturer.

A lot of Teslas are also just leased.

mytailorisrich• 5 years ago

In the UK that would be interference with goods (a tort) or taking a vehicle without the owner's consent (a criminal offense).

Still in the UK, although I suspect that holds more generally, when you buy something using a loan you own it. What you bought may be a security for the loan but that's different. Leasing a car or using a lease/purchase scheme is also different since leasing means you rent but don't own.

oh_sigh• 5 years ago

Yes, you really own the vehicle, and that is why if Tesla intentionally just bricks/locks you out of your car because they feel like it, you would sue them and almost certainly win in court.

zionic• 5 years ago

I agree with you, but he same is true for physical keys. A car dealership can create a working key to steal/repossess your car in much the same way.

We really need to move to strong crypto.

giobox2• 5 years ago

This is by no means limited to Tesla, and is true of almost every new car sold now.

As an example, almost every new Ford sold in the USA since 2019 has standard 5G/GPS remote connectivity; even the cheapest entry level cars at Ford like the new Maverick can remotely over 5G unlock doors and remote start the engine (just like the 'owner' can in the Ford pass app, now standard spec on virtually all Fords.). The manufacturers of course love the extra usage metrics and can also over the air sell upgrades like 5G hotspot access and so forth. Many cars now have 5G/GPS receiver for metrics even if no connectivity or nav features whatsoever exposed to user.

My point is; aside from the use of "summon", this kind of locate, remote unlock and start by manufacturer is available on almost all new cars sold today, no matter how cheap - the 5G remote access tech has become increasingly ubiquitous. This is not something unique to the way Tesla creates it cars at all, especially in 2021.

https://www.ford.com/support/how-tos/fordpass/fordpass-remot...

greatpatton• 5 years ago

Not much into US law, but can someone tell us what is happening if you had personal possession of value in your car?

LightG6• 5 years ago

This is my problem with it.

Not that payments shouldn't be kept up to date. But that it moves decision making on the issue to a corporate entity a million miles away and you can bet there won't be any accounting for personal situations, or admin errors, or anything else. Your car will just be gone.

Sorry, f@ck tesla on this.

fallingknife3• 5 years ago

If lenders had to take "personal situations" into account no loans would be made. Anyone can come up with a sob story.

alkonaut• 5 years ago

If this wasn't preceded by months of angry letters explaining when and why the security would be repossessed, then yes. Shitty. However, if the owner was made aware that the vehicle would be reposessed, then obviously there isn't much else the lender can do. The owner has (hopefully) already dodged several opportunities to simply drop the vehicle off.

belltaco• 5 years ago

Are you saying it's better to take loans from the local mafia.

dev_tty013• 5 years ago

No, there are consumer protection laws in most, if not all, states that require a period of notification and discussion prior to repossession. When a car is repossessed it should never be a surprise to the "owner."

teh_klev2• 5 years ago

Your car will just be gone

If the loan is secured on the car then it's not "your car" until the loan is paid.

But sure you're right, mistakes can be made and being able to switch off your car remotely is somewhat dystopian even if you're 100% in the clear.

Tuna-Fish• 5 years ago

The same as would happen in any other repo case. The repo agent bags them, writes an inventory of them, and must return them on request. Different states have different laws on the conditions on that. Most don't allow any fees to be charged for this, but generally you have to go get them, they won't be brought to you.

Huge amounts of stuff is never returned, either because the repo guys were careless/stole it, because retrieving is hard/inconvenient for someone who no longer has a car, or because the owners just don't care.

LightG6• 5 years ago

Holy sh!t ... reason 47 to not buy a Tesla.

arendtio• 5 years ago

Is 'buy' the correct verb in this context? I mean, if you would buy it in the traditional sense you wouldn't have any monthly payments you could miss and you would actually own the car. But this case seems a bit different.

hatchnyc• 5 years ago

So…in case you plan to not pay for it but still keep it anyway?

I am really struggling to understand the mindset here of what I assume are mostly well paid professional software developers. If I defaulted on a car loan (I don’t know the details exactly off the top of my head, but this entails more than just missing a payment) I’d be quite ashamed of myself and return the car myself with an apology. I cannot understand the mindset of someone who would feel justified keeping the car, much less getting angry at the method used by the bank to reclaim their property.

It’s not like this is a cheap car either where you’re threatening someone’s livelihood who is not going to be able to get to work.

sschueller2• 5 years ago

It has happened that cars and even homes have been "repoed" as a result due to a mistake by a bank.

themitigating4• 5 years ago

Because on hackernews if the story features Facebook, Google, Microsoft, or Tesla what they did is bad

foxfluff• 5 years ago

I cannot understand the mindset of someone who would feel justified keeping the car

No-one said anything about feeling justified keeping the car. People take issue with the backdoor. I too, would rather clean the car, take my stuff, and return it with an apology (if the bank refuses to negotiate an extension to the loan) than find that a backdoor has been used against me and it's just all gone one day.

selfhoster11• 5 years ago

That's not the point. The car has a capability to lock you out, and all it takes is for someone to activate that capability. I don't want that in a car.

LightG6• 5 years ago

I appreciate I left little to assist your conclusion, but that isn't it at all.

This isn't the the path I want us going down. If this applies / impacts a few thousand Tesla 'owners' so enamoured by the that cultish brand that they'll accept this BS, so be it.

But apply variations of this to the world, and the countless mistakes and mishaps that can happen and you're in further down into a nasty world of things happening.

I mean, look at getting something fixed with Google or a Facebook. Those bastions of the tech world.

It has absolutely nothing to do with the money aspect of this.

Case in point: literally this happened yesterday. I set up a D/D with one of our internet providers 3 months ago. They have been chasing me for 3 months for payments. New supplier so their email went to spam. I have evidence I did all the right things to do this. And yet, yesterday, I checked my spam luckily and there was a 7 day suspension notice if the bill wasn't paid. So, basically, our business internet connections relied on me being lucky that I caught a stray e-mail ... apply this to your car ... or your home (where there have been stories of this kind of BS, only for the owner come home and realise their home had been sold on and they can't get it back).

Basically, automation is great, but don't automate interaction with your customers on key situatons.

zo12• 5 years ago

Reason No 26 to buy a Tesla - This feature makes it more difficult for it to be stolen.

dev_tty013• 5 years ago

The repossession has nothing to do with it being a Tesla. Cars are repossessed every day. The unlocking made it easier, but without that assistance, a repossessor would just drag it up a ramp onto a truck and drive off.

throw8932894• 5 years ago

What is legality of making alternative firmware for Tesla? I guess they could argue with safety. Does the car loose road worthy certification, if its software is altered?

roastedpeacock• 5 years ago

Can't comment on certifications but aftermarket performance upgrades that are not from Tesla already exist through hardware modification with some attempt at the "cat and mouse" game of detection and evasion one might expect from such activities. Haven't hard of any lawyers getting involved though.

I would assume if you do something dumb with the electronics or software you wold probably be found liable in terms of insurance.

taylorportman• 5 years ago

Definitely needs to be a thing. idk if it has been on HN yet but there is a opengarages.org site that has a nice ebook if anyone is interested.

prmoustache3• 5 years ago

As a bicycle and old motorcycles user I am gobsmacked that so much people accept that the vehicule they are using is connected or regularly phone home to the manufacturer. I guess if you share all your life on facebook and instagram, why shouldn't you also give away all your errands to any third party.

Is there at least a license agreement you are showned at and have to agree to upon delivery? Can you operate those vehicules offline by choice?

grishka3• 5 years ago

Also, what happens if you remove the SIM card or the cellular antenna?

rndgermandude2• 5 years ago

There was a story of some rental car that couldn't be unlocked again on some remote parking lot, because it was out of range. The customer did nothing wrong. They ended up having to tow the car in the end, if I remember correctly.

With actual possession of vehicles going down, in favor of leases (or leases-to-buy) and short term rentals/"ride-sharing", and with ever more permanent monitoring, the future seems to go into a direction where you're required to have a constantly available data connection in your car back to the car company or lease company, and they will be able to remotely disable access if you don't pay up. And they will probably consider loss of such connection as "tampering" and disable the cars until it gets online again.

lnsru• 5 years ago

All the data is stored in the car and next time during regular service it gets transferred to the manufacturer using wired connection? Have no proof for that, but it sounds very reasonable and technically doable to me.

beanjuiceII• 5 years ago

I am not really surprised people don't care, they mostly want technology for either status or convenience and I don't think I can blame them for the latter

authed2• 5 years ago

From 2014: Ford Exec: 'We Know Everyone Who Breaks The Law' Thanks To Our GPS In Your Car

https://www.businessinsider.com/ford-exec-gps-2014-1

I too wish that there would be an easy way to disconnect my car (it is of zero use to me).

driverdan• 5 years ago

Take the SIM card out. Or better yet, don't buy a car that tracks you.

nogridbag• 5 years ago

It may be preferable to have some automated system that fines you for excessive speeding versus the alternative: police with guns. At least in the United States.

akvadrako• 5 years ago

I'm not sure how your bicycle usage is relevant. Many new electric bikes also have GPS + SIM tracking.

tonyedgecombe3• 5 years ago

Many new electric bikes also have GPS + SIM tracking.

A few.

prmoustache3• 5 years ago

Well all my bikes are "muscular bikes" for one thing, and I build most of them out of spare parts. And I haven't jumped on the electronic shifting band wagon either. I don't necessarily see all these technos as bad but I spend enough time in front of my computer and I want my bikes to stay part of the analog world.

maxdo5• 5 years ago

Why would I want so? I want to warm up/cool the car before i get into it, listen for the music without plugging my phone every time , have a decent gps that is free, notify me about traffic, tell me if the charging station i'm going to is busy, alert me if someone is breaking in into my car. Heck I can even check the camera's from my App so I don't need to run if this is false alarm. I can even say something to this person to scare him away before he/she broke the glass.

Thank you but no. Tesla sales are skyrocketing because people want smart car that makes their life easier, safer. Legacy car makers also trying to keep up with trend.

It's a typical misconception. You were young back in the days the car didn't have all this amazing features. Not having this features doesn't this car magical just because of your sentiments about you been young. Driving a dumb car will not make you younger either.

I'll surprise you, most of tesla owners pay extra money ($10/mo) to have a better connectivity. Not the other way around.

AdrianB12• 5 years ago

Imagine you live in Texas, there is a massive power failure that also affects cellular towers and the car you need to use to save your live does not work because it is so smart online, but too dumb or not working at all offline. Then pay extra 10$ for that.

steelframe2• 5 years ago

For me it's about control. I'm fine with having whiz-bang features on my equipment, so long as I am the final authority on anything and everything about them.

About a year ago I took my fancy EV on a ferry. I kept it on and ran the air conditioner because it was hot outside. Partway through the crossing I guess the suspension sensors interpreted the boat rocking as "something is seriously screwed up," and it locked the brakes and wouldn't release them when it was time to disembark. I had to sit there in my fancy EV looking like an idiot while everyone filtered around me and I took another trip across the water with cones around the car.

When I frantically called the dealership in the middle of all that, they said, "Sorry, your car has decided that it isn't safe to drive. You'll have to get it towed in so we can take a look at it. Oh, and since you're on a ferry, our roadside assistance won't help you. Good luck!" When I asked the ferry staff what I should do, they replied, "Uh, usually we just ask the owner to shift into neutral, and we push the car off." Only the car decided for me that this wasn't a possibility, and the brakes remained engaged with no way for me to disengage them.

The next thing I did after I finally got back home was research which cars I could still buy today with manual transmission and an emergency brake attached to a lever and a cable. It's not at all about holding onto my youth. It's about being the final authority over my own goddamned property.

prmoustache3• 5 years ago

These kinds of features could, and should be optionnally usable by connecting your car to an open source self hosted server.

There is no need to send everything to the manufacturer and a way to avoid that should be mandatory.

beervirus• 5 years ago

I mean I already bring my phone with me on those errands. My location isn’t exactly a secret.

It sucks, and I hate it. But the car isn’t any additional problem.

natch2• 5 years ago

I'm not sure what would break if it was offline.

I do know you can drive the car while the computer is rebooting (when it's rebooting the screen is completely black and you have to gauge your speed by comparison to other cars the road), so in theory it seems you don't need the computer for basic driving, which would suggest maybe what you say is also possible, if there's a setting for it.

I haven't checked because I like the benefits of being connected — starting and stopping a charge remotely, seeing the state of charge while it's charging somewhere far away, opening / closing windows, unlocking the car, flashing lights or honking horn to locate car, preheating, and coming soon, seeing car's location on a map when it's being driven by someone else, viewing live dash cam (sentry) footage while the car is parked remotely, etc. etc.

I mean I do see your point but I've listed some of the benefits, and life is full of tradeoffs. I'm not saying that the takeoffs that work for me would ever in a million years work for you.

It would also be great if all of the above could be done through a neutral third party or through one's own server. But as a startup that was struggling at the beginning, that probably wasn't the low hanging fruit for Tesla to work on, and there are benefits for Tesla to having the connection be to Tesla. And some of those benefits accrue indirectly back to consumers through safer cars, better accountability for accidents, and better data for future self driving software.

eulers_secret• 5 years ago

seeing car's location on a map when it's being driven by someone else, viewing live dash cam (sentry) footage while the car is parked remotely...

I'm concerned these features in specific may be used by abusive spouses to track and control their partners (or extract revenge upon them). It's honestly pretty grim when you can't even use the "shared" (abuser likely would be the sole 'owner' on the title) vehicles to escape an abusive situation. Any upside of this kind of feature is very must overshadowed by the abuses enabled.

Additionally, I'm sad that if I do something stupid in a parking lot (say I fall and hurt myself) that the video can be recorded by any number of vehicles and posted to facebook/youtube/etc for yucks. Nothing can be done about it, there's no way to stop it. I hate it, though, and I hate that people are excited for these terrible slipshod "features" that won't help them as much as they hurt others.

maximus-decimus• 5 years ago

Google knows exactly where I do my groceries because of my phone's gps. They even send me a report every month to tell me everywhere I went.

bell-cot• 5 years ago

Is this only news "because Tesla"? User jcims mentioned Ford's having the same feature. Probably GM's do, too. For years, I've seen occasional news stories about car dealers adding similar features to vehicles which they sell to buyers with sketchy credit.

ethagknight• 5 years ago

I feel pretty confident that GM’s Onstar is primarily a service oriented for GMAC/ally so they can locate and limit speeds and unlock vehicles they hold title to but have not received payment for. Oh and sure they give you a big blue button to punch in case you have a flat tire, for peace of mind. They advertised the speed limiter capability “in case of a vehicle theft” and repo situation (driving a vehicle not paid for) isn’t too far removed from theft

fxtentacle4• 5 years ago

The advantage of autonomous cars is that they can resist their owner. That enables big cost savings for everyone (insurance, manufacturer, rental, leasing, repo). Well, everyone except for the "owner".

shadowgovt2• 5 years ago

Who is legally the owner when a car is repossessed?

I'd say autonomous vehicles are pro-social machines. They will, in general, act to follow the rules established, ideally more often than a "dumb" car operated by a human.

Given how many traffic accidents are human caused, that's sort of the point of the entire exercise.

fxtentacle4• 5 years ago

I would argue that before it is successfully repossessed, the old person is still the owner. They'd also be the one liable if something goes wrong. So we have disconnected the liabilities of ownership from the advantages of ownership. In the past, this type of disconnect has led to companies exploiting it for profit.

themitigating4• 5 years ago

You don't own the car that's financed until you pay it off

martin8412• 5 years ago

Here you do. A lien is placed on the car, so any debt follows the car in the case of transfer of ownership.

That said, repossession of things are not a thing here either.

fxtentacle4• 5 years ago

In some countries, you do. The contract for borrowing the money and the contract for purchasing the car are then separable.

sschueller2• 5 years ago

Will Mercedes or another brand clone a key for the repo man without a court order?

scottlilly• 5 years ago

Yes.

I was a repo man in the 1980s. When we'd get the repossession paperwork from the bank, we'd also get a copy of the car's title. We'd take that paperwork into a dealership and they would cut us duplicate keys.

bluedino• 5 years ago

This is nothing compared to the tactics a "buy here, pay here" car lot will use.

iRobbery• 5 years ago

So how does this change "Possession Is Nine-Tenths of the Law" :) five-tenths? :)

xyst• 5 years ago

Why does Tesla even care if the car owner is delinquent on the bank note? At the time of the sale, Tesla was paid in full by the bank.

Is Tesla trying to become the underwriter of future loans, and this is their way of testing their automated repossession process?

oxymoran2• 5 years ago

They don’t need to be the underwriter to affect the underwriting process. By enabling this feature, banks could be more willing to make loans to credit challenged people, thus rendering more Tesla’s on the road.

oxymoran2• 5 years ago

Ya’ll are overlooking the reasoning behind this for Tesla: this would make a bank more willing to give out a loan to nearly anyone, even with questionable credit, if the car assisted with its own repo. It’s a play to get more Teslas on the road.

the_optimist• 5 years ago

Only in the same sense as making any usability improvement. Making car loans in general is also “a play to sell more cars.” There’s no point to such interpretation.

323• 5 years ago

The police should also have the capability of remotely stopping a running away car. Hopefully this feature will be standardized.

jasonhansel• 5 years ago

You mean OnStar's "Stolen Vehicle Slowdown" feature?

mschuster912• 5 years ago

Jesus no. The potential for abuse is just way too high. We can't even trust cops to not stalk random women [1] or to not beat up their family [2] - giving them even more possibilities to conduct crimes is not a good thing. Not to mention: what the police can exploit, so can attackers.

[1] https://psmag.com/news/stalker-cop-police-protection-danger-...

[2] https://sites.temple.edu/klugman/2020/07/20/do-40-of-police-...

defaultprimate4• 5 years ago

I agree that this capability should never, ever be in the hands of the state, but don't extrapolate isolated instances and debunked statistics about the police as truths. Your own article demonstrates one of the major flaws of the domestic violence statistic, but doesn't discuss the most egregious methodological flaw: the criteria used for domestic violence, which includes shouting in the cited study.

Cops are sourced from the general population, so incidence rates need to be compared to the general population, and you'll find that police have significantly lower "negative" behaviors compared to the general population in virtually all aspects. That doesn't mean they should be allowed to remotely disable your car though.

gonzoflip10• 5 years ago

I completely disagree, I cherish my personal freedom and will not be buying any connected vehicle for as long as possible because of that.

throwaway2048• 5 years ago

Every new car has GPS tracking and cellular antennas in them and has for almost a decade.

Quindecillion• 5 years ago

Has anyone "jailbroke" a Telsa to remove this type of stuff?

_fat_santa• 5 years ago

It's two sides to the same coin. The stuff that makes this possible is the same stuff that makes all the futuristic tech on a Tesla possible. So you could theoretically jailbreak it (Rich Rebuilds probably figured it out by now) disabling the stuff that would allow this to happen would also disable half the futuristic features on your car.

bitcharmer• 5 years ago

disabling the stuff that would allow this to happen would also disable half the futuristic features on your car.

Why?

When you jailbreak an iPhone you don't loose features.

JohnWhigham• 5 years ago

This is the future we chose. I hope everyone here that owns a Tesla is proud of that future.

travisporter2• 5 years ago

I had a medical bill for a small amount like $60 sent to collections because they didn’t have the right address. Never called or emailed me. Judging by the comments here, the healthcare co would be well within its rights to pickpocket me.

soared• 5 years ago

What was the outcome? I am currently in the same situation.

travisporter2• 5 years ago

I finally got my mail from the new renter and called and chewed them out. Had to pay the original bill.

Edit I chewed out the billing dept not the renter lol

wbc• 5 years ago

he declared bankruptcy

notreallyserio4• 5 years ago

With insufficient information we must always defer to the corporation or the government. Might makes right.

beeboop• 5 years ago

Garnishing wages is very much a real thing.

my_usernam3• 5 years ago

Ugh I just had the same exact experience... right as I'm trying to get a mortgage. I wish they would have just pickpocketed me and not try to murder my credit over like $100.

maxdo5• 5 years ago

to every person writing here "is this the future we will be living in"? So do you want legal owners hire people who will spy on you, ask family members where is the car, etc...

After they'll find the car their life will be more complicated , they need to make a key. Coordinate if this is the right car. If car is locked/has custom security, lots of noise in neighborhood due to alarm, so basically everyone around your block is stressed because you didn't pay.

And that's fees people who pay the bills will cover. Do you think this kind of services are cheap? If they can't return the car, that will be also split between future lease agreement. They will be included one way or another in your loan/monthly payments.

Doing so , they basically decreasing the price of such event at least 5x.

izacus2• 5 years ago

So at what point will Teslas also start snitching on their own owners and other drivers for driving too fast, being in the wrong place at the time a crime happened and reporting copyrighted music played in the wrong country?

Is there already a design doc for that somewhere in Teslas ticketing system?

test65542• 5 years ago

Once all cars are self-driving, I doubt they will exceed the speed limit by much. But perhaps speed limits will increase in some places.

izacus2• 5 years ago

Well, the autopilot cameras can easily report OTHER drivers not driving correctly.

tonyedgecombe3• 5 years ago

To be honest I would quite like it if cars couldn't speed whilst passing my house.

unbanned• 5 years ago

Just checked, there's ability to phone home given particular driving conditions for safety.

mellavora• 5 years ago

well, they are planning on offering their own car insurance program.

Funny thing is, the initial sell of Tesla was 'high performance', the kind of driving which tends to encourage high-risk behaviours.

so now it is "you can buy this great car with all this high-performance stuff, but we'll know every time you use it and dock you on insurance rates to compensate"

bloomark• 5 years ago

They already provide their own insurance. My brother's Model Y, that he has Tesla insurance for in CA, makes wonky noises when he's engaging in unsafe driving (not looking at the road, breaking too late, etc) and he said it might affect his insurance rate as well.

chaostheory4• 5 years ago

Your smartphone does that just fine and has been done so for years now.

exadeci• 5 years ago

The car was technically Tesla's property they contracted the repo agent because the owner stopped paying the finance so as long as you haven't finished paying your car to Tesla it makes sense for it to still be their property.

The issue would be if they start doing this for illegal parking or similar stuff.

gonzoflip10• 5 years ago

I think the personal freedom and privacy implications of self driving cars with centralized communication are rarely talked about. What happens when your vehicle decides you can't travel to an area of civil unrest (for your safety), or refuses to drive you to the gun store?

test65542• 5 years ago

Ramming into protesters vehicle package should be selected at time of purchase and will cost an extra $74.99.

gonzoflip10• 5 years ago

Hmmm, I feel like this reply is making light of other's deaths. I was more talking about the ability to attend a protest. I believe in personal freedom, as well as personal responsibility.

dangus3• 5 years ago

I don't think this is quite that extreme of a slippery slope.

For one, areas of unrest are already restricted by physical police and national guard barriers. For example, during the unrest in 2020, Chicago physically raised its drawbridges. Anyone who really wants to get somewhere difficult would probably choose a bicycle or legs, so you need physical police barriers in that case.

Refusing to drive you to the gun store sounds kind of silly when the government would more easily just ban gun stores (the right to bear arms doesn't include the right to buy them at a retail store). I realize you're just giving out an example but it was not a great one. Preventing you from driving somewhere is a simple as putting up a gate and closing it.

Also, driving at all is not a right. It's a licensed privilege that can be taken away if you break traffic laws or drive while intoxicated.

I think your perspective is coming from a car-focused area of the country (which is most of them). But, someone in NYC or Chicago might point out to you that they use a transit card that has the ability to track their movements through stations, and that they mainly travel by buses and trains that have government-owned surveillance cameras all over them. Despite this, it has has failed to turn into any kind of dystopian urban nightmare.

What I'm getting at is that the technology is blamed for things that are actually just public policy, laws, and law enforcement. The privacy implications for using a smartphone in the Western world are a lot different than in China, even though the technology itself is identical.

What we actually need is legislation surrounding automotive communication and centralized control and privacy. The rights that automobile owners have should be better enshrined in law rather than trusting auto manufacturers. This, I think, will eventually happen. We're still sorely lacking a general nationwide privacy law on the Internet in the US.

gonzoflip10• 5 years ago

Nah, I will continue to buy disconnected vehicles for as long as possible since I chose to live in a rural area of the country, and I expect my machine to start when I tell it to. People that live in Chicago or New York choose to give up their ability to travel without the need for the government that is their choice. And didn't the pandemic have a major impact on some public transit lines operation? Again I believe in personal responsibility and freedom, I choose not to have that level of reliance on others. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/06/nyregion/mass-transit-ser...

And while driving on public roads is not a right, I still want my vehicle to start regardless of the governments opinions on whether I should be traveling :)

I chose guns because it was something that large corps like to virtue signal about. Also, while the bill of rights does not protect buying guns at retail, most of the cries for increased gun control actually want people to be forced to buy firearms in a retail setting so that the transfer can be tracked in the nation DB, which does not happen with private sales.

Also, multiple cities literally shut down transit during the protests last year due to "safety". https://www.masstransitmag.com/safety-security/article/21140...

chaostheory4• 5 years ago

GM cars have phoned home for well over a decade now. Self driving features tend to also be extra optional features that cost more.

gonzoflip10• 5 years ago

So what? People can choose to have connected vehicles if they want. I choose to avoid them and the newest gm vehicle I have owned was a 1997 Saturn. My personal choices and decisions are a product of my values and beliefs, and I intend on avoiding the potential for remote intervention as long as possible.

Wiseacre• 5 years ago

Wait until the cars are required to drive you to the police station when you are accused of a crime....

aasasd2• 5 years ago

A bunch of years ago, when Tesla and Google's car were only just starting and it was fashionable to discuss the implications of self-driving cars, one dude wrote (approximately):

People are discussing: if the car has to choose between running over a pedestrian and sacrificing the driver's life, what should it choose? Well it's obvious: the driver pays for the car, so they wouldn't buy a car that kills them in case of an incident.

I guess now that we're headed straight into cyberpunk, the driver's wish turns out to be not that important. The overriding concern is actually: what will make the company look better. If swerving into trees wins points for Tesla for saving pedestrians' lives, so be it.

015a• 5 years ago

I'm pretty strongly of the position that high levels of self-driving are impossible for artificial intelligences to attain, because they're built by corporations. Driving is VERY risky, and involves an irreducible assumption of both risk and liability on behalf of the driver. Humans are natural risk-takers. Corporations are not; and any artificial intelligence a corporation produces is always, at some level of meaningful abstraction, a projection of their own values.

Datenstrom• 5 years ago

From Tesla's release of their full self-driving beta and its performance in a recent CGP Grey video where it successfully navigates the most dangerous road in America[1] I think a lot of people are going to have to eat their hats on this stance very soon.

I consider myself bullish on this tech, and I have worked closely with autonomous robotics, but I didn't expect it this soon.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6tgmGqXysM

defaultprimate4• 5 years ago

While I agree with you 100%. High level self driving is impossible on a technical level too imo, there's too many aspects of human perception, processing, and intuition that aren't possible to emulate or account for in, what machine learning really boils down to, a statistical model. There will always be novel situations that you can't simply math your way out of that a human could navigate effortlessly.

borkyborkbork• 5 years ago

I wouldn't describe Tesla as a corporation that is risk averse.

the84722• 5 years ago

Those are irrelevant tangents. You don't win the game by being best at solving the trolley problem. You win the game by making a car that is good at not crashing.

AdrianB12• 5 years ago

A few years ago Netflix had a problem processing the payment for my subscription. They charged me again, also had problems, charged again. 3 times, every time the money left my account as the bank confirmed. A few days later, with no warning, they suspended my account while I was watching a movie.

I don't like the power these companies have in relation with their customers. The customer has no power at all, in most cases. In my case I had to ask the bank to revert the charges and close my Netflix subscription, but it was just ~ $30-40 at stake, not a $50,000 car. How many times cars are repossessed without any fault of the customer?

dangus3• 5 years ago

"Tesla hired him"

Does this mean that Tesla is the owner of the loan?

I'm skeptical that Tesla will be helping random banks get their money back like this, but it sounds like this is direct financing through Tesla.

Also, keep in mind that this is just a tweet with a picture of a car on a trailer. This is absolutely not verified as true. Tesla nor the car's owner have verified or commented on this from what we can see in this article. Literally just some guy who says "a friend told me."

jmkni• 5 years ago

I remember watching a Defcon talk years ago by Barnaby Jack (RIP) who warned of this exact scenario, but in a medical sense.

ie. you take out a loan to pay for some sort of medical implant, you miss your payments, and they can turn it off.

I can't find the exact video, if anyone has I'd love a link!

latortuga• 5 years ago

There's a movie with exactly this plot, Repo Man I think it's called.

bszupnick• 5 years ago

Repo! The Genetic Opera

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repo!_The_Genetic_Opera

hereforphone• 5 years ago

Do you want to lose your potential customer base? Because this is how you lose your potential customer base.

gregoriol• 5 years ago

Knowing that Musk had the project to let your car drive as an automatic taxi without you, this is not surprising. We will have to get used to cars doing stuff without their driver.

sangnoir2• 5 years ago

Helpful mental model to help you overcome bias: imagine for a moment, that instead of Tesla, it was that company you hate doing this. You know, that privacy-invading company that's just the worst - would you still feel the same?

teawrecks• 5 years ago

"They mentioned once FSD is better, they’ll probably just have the cars drive themselves back to Tesla in this situation. Technology is amazing."

That's the happiest I've heard someone be about their friend's job being automated away :D

nowherebeen• 5 years ago

Can't wait for someone to introduce a dumb electronic car.

hollosi• 5 years ago

Probably fake news.

Tesla cars are not licensed for operation without a control of a driver. It's unlikely Tesla (the company) would take the financial responsibility to cause any damage or injury during an unlicensed operation without a driver.

Straight from the Model S manual:

"Model S may not detect certain obstacles, including those that are very narrow (e.g., bikes), lower than the fascia, or hanging from the ceiling. As such, Summon requires that you continually monitor your vehicle's movement and surroundings while it is in progress, and that you remain prepared to stop the vehicle at any time using the Tesla mobile app, by pressing any button on the key fob, or by pressing any Model S door handle."

https://www.tesla.com/sites/default/files/Model_S_release_no...

wilde• 5 years ago

Lowering friction amplifies your ability to make mistakes. Yes, this is legal. But the increase in scale of these actions is probably bad. I’d hate to see what Hertz would do with this tech.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hertz-customers-allege-false-ar...

Tesla remotely unlocks Model 3 car, uses smart summon to help repo agent

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