They lied to the DMV, that alone is enough to ban them.
- Not be forthcoming with authorities on releasing information/video
- Be misrepresenting the performance of their vehicles to the authorities
This is just not acceptable for a company to be doing. This is not how we disrupt industries. You cannot "fake it till you make it" with road safety when building vehicles that traverse roads safely is your business' entire raison d'etre! That's just unacceptable, full stop.
And, add to it, Cruise has been given a direct and clear path to resuming operations, which essentially boils down to doing the thing they should've been doing already. Like come on! How much more benevolent can we ask a regulator to be in this scenario? One could argue, frankly, that they're being too kid gloves about a company lying to an organization who's primary goal is ensuring safety about safety!
During the certification process for these self-driving cars, incidents of the cars “misbehaving” (for lack of a better term) were supposed to be reported. However, if a human driver intervened, then it didn’t count as the car itself making a poor choice.
Example: self-driving car approaches an intersection clipping a reasonable speed and the light turns yellow. While a human driver would understand that it’s better to go through than to slam their brakes, the self-driving cat goes “yellow means red soon, stop now”. The human driver overrides and floors it through the intersection. Had the car stopped, that would’ve been a mark against the autonomous system. But since a human intervened, it doesn’t “count”.
This is a good watch on the state of self-driving cars and how policy makers have largely just said “eh, fuck it” in places like SF. https://youtu.be/pmGOjHi-7MM
The DMV was not aware of that until notified by another government agency that was investigating the incident.