A regulator says driver assistance is not what is advertised.
A California regulator accused the Tesla company of scam to consumers about their driver assistance systems and filed a demand that could prevent the automaker from selling its production in the state, US media reported on Friday.
In its filing, the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) said that Tesla advertised its autopilot and autonomous driving technologies as more capable than they really areas reported by the Los Angeles Times.
The company «made or disseminated statements that are false or misleading and not based on fact,» says the lawsuit, filed July 28 in court with the Office of Administrative Hearings.
Tesla cars could never and they can’t operate now as autonomous vehicles,» the DMV said, the California newspaper reported.
The regulator did not immediately respond to AFP’s request for comment.
Tesla’s website describes its Autopilot as having «full self-driving capability.»
«All the driver will have to do is get into your vehicle and tell you where to go,» he says. «If he doesn’t say anything to you, the car will look at his schedule and will take there as the assumed destiny».
A ruling in favor of the California regulator could have serious consequences for the electric carmaker, including a possible revocation of the licenses that authorize Tesla to make or sell its cars in the state, according to the Times.
But a DMV spokesman told the newspaper that the agency would actually aim for Tesla to better educate drivers about its self-driving vehicles and admit the limitations of its technology.
Tesla vehicles equipped with autonomous driving software have been involved in 273 accidents in the United States, according to a report released in June by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which is investigating the automaker.
In June, Tesla owner Elon Musk highlighted the importance of fully autonomous driving, saying that without it the value of his company would be «close to zero.»
The purchase of Twitter: now it wants to move forward
Elon Musk assured this Saturday that his planned acquisition of Twitter by $44 billion should go ahead if the company can confirm some details about how it measures whether user accounts are spam or real people.
«If Twitter simply provides its method of sampling 100 accounts and how they are confirmed to be real, the deal must continue on original terms,» Musk tweeted early on Saturday.
«However, if it turns out that your SEC filings are materially false, then you should not do so,» the businessman added.
Twitter responded immediately, rejecting the comment.
The billionaire has been trying to back out of his April deal to buy the social media company. For that reason, Twitter decided to sue him last month to complete the acquisition.
Musk was quick to respond, accusing Twitter of misleading his team about the true size of its user base and other issues that he said amounted to fraud and non-compliance of contract.
Musk this week accused Twitter of «fraud» in a countersuit over the aborted deal to acquire the social network for $44 billion, which he claimed hid necessary information and misled his team about its true user base. published press reports.
Musk’s lawyers accuse Twitter of having «masked the truth» about the number of monetizable daily users, which the social network calculates in 238 million.