Software that controls multi-thousand pound machines at 70+mph isn't typical, and typical practices don't necessarily apply.
Coaxing regulators into producing a test that can be optimized for is exactly how we got the WW scandal.
> What regulators need to do is keep up with the times.
Keeping up with the times sounds awfully like allowing insane things because some whiz kid believes there's no difference between a car and a website.
Imagine an airbag incorrectly deployed sometimes, and the fix was to use a GPS geofence disable the airbag entirely on the test track, but only on days when the regulator was trying to reproduce spurious airbag deployments, not on crash test days.
Regulators were concerned after a car on non-FSD Autopilot (AKA Auto-Steer + Traffic Aware Cruise Control) hit an emergency vehicle parked half way in the right lane of a highway due to driver inattention. Tesla quickly pushed an update that uses ML to detect emergency lights and slow to a stop until the driver pushes on the accelerator to indicate it is clear to go.
That's not cheating, that's life-saving technology. No other steer assist technology gets (or sometimes is even capable of getting) updates that fast.
Contempt is such an overused tactic, and never meant anything anyway. Plus, it doesn't sound unrealistic to me.
What process is used to make such decisions?
It's not typical software development in life-critical systems. If you think it is, you should not be working on life-critical systems.
So if a pharmacy swindles you out of your money or gives you fake drugs, I should reply 'that's just typical drug dealer'
Cars will never be software, much like pacemakers and ICDs won't ever be software