Tesla Recalls 2M Vehicles over Autopilot Software Issue | Hacker News Reader

Tesla Recalls 2M Vehicles over Autopilot Software Issue

nytimes.com

155 pointsrgbrgb142 comments

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Note: “tesla recalls” == “tesla pushes OTA software update (just like any regular OTA update)”

gotta love the NYT for accurate headlines

It's not incorrect, it's just confusing:

https://cleantechnica.com/2022/07/24/is-recall-really-the-ri...

The NYT is more than capable of making a clear headline. These are not stupid people. But they do have goals.

The headline is perfectly clear and is not using language in a new way. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) issues recalls for safety related issues. The way the manufacture resolves the issues can differ.

If the average user on HN needs an explanation that a word in a title actually has a completely different effective meaning, I'd say that it is unlikely to be a clear title.

I agree, Tesla should change the name of their driver assistance suite.

I see no evidence that the average user on HN needed an explanation. I think a small minority needed one.

Here is Tesla's recall page: https://www.tesla.com/support/annual-and-recall-service

Several of these were fixed with OTA updates. Tesla doesn't seem to be confused on the meaning of the word. This very site has had these exact OTA recall submissions for years.

I would say on HN you're far more likely to get some "whell ahcktuwally" comments in the most counterproductive way, particularly because there are so many Tesla and Musk fans that immediately become defensive vs any negative news or criticism of each and engage in semantic quibbling to deflect.

Recall is the correct word to use for this sort of NTSC action. Most people understand what it means and don't care about OTA vs plugging in an ODB port.

> Most people […] don't care about OTA vs plugging in an ODB port.

Yes, they do.

For the former, you just let the car autoupdate and that’s it. For the latter, you gotta drive to a dealership/service center and leave your car there so that the service center employees can resolve it via “plugging in an ODB port.”

One requires much more work and effort than the other on the part of the driver. For one, I think most people would care about having to potentially take a day off work + figure out their transportation while the recall issue is being resolved at the service center.

I am of course aware of that. We're talking about the semantics of the word recall however.

Sure, you're technically correct, but when the average person reads "recall" they typically assume something very different. Doubly so since this isn't even a bug fix, just a new requirement to add additional safety checks above and beyond the ones already there.

There's no reason the headline couldn't have read something like "Tesla Issues Software Update at Request of NHTSA", which would be less likely to confuse the average reader, but also less attention-grabbing.

In the old days, recalls meant the car had to go back to the dealer for a fix. Then "recall" got a legal meaning, and as we moved to cars that could be updated at home, the term stuck because it is now enshrined in official regulation. It is just anachronistic terminology now like "hang up the phone."

The average person can learn what the term means when they get the notification in the mail from Tesla (which will state that there is a recall and it will be handled by an OTA update). Or they could read the article and not rely on the headline to get their full understanding of the issue. If the average user panics from the headline... good. This is a safety issue and they should be made aware of it.

The average person understands “recall” to mean “something about my car may be unsafe, I should read it”. If you’ve owned a car, you’ve gotten plenty of these and many of them are minor - for example, when I lived in San Diego I did not race to the dealership when Subaru put out a recall telling you to have the underbody inspected for defects which could cause elevated corrosion with frequent exposure to road salt because I knew my vehicle didn’t fall into that category. The recall mechanism meant I got it taken care of a year later when I had other work being done.

The only people claiming to be confused here appear to be Tesla fans who are reacting emotionally to their favorite company getting negative attention. I see no sign that any of them were concerned about a standard industry term before today.

what do you think their goals are? where do they get them?

I actually dont think this article/headline is that egregious. But in general anything having to do with Musk/Tesla is going to be put in a negative light. And I think we all know why. Election season, twitter ownership, etc etc.

As an observer:

Elon is a cringey based edgelord, accelerated the decline of their favorite platform (Twitter), re-platforms and signal boosts people/grifters with dangerous ideas, and all of that outweighs, in their estimation, whatever good will he earned with Tesla/SpaceX in the prior decade.

Oh, he’s also a generationally wealthy South African. They’re on one side of the culture war, he’s (newly?) on the other.

They want him stripped of influence. Or maybe they’re just really big fans of Kia and Volkswagen, dunno.

In this case, the goal is using the industry standard term to refer to a specific action defined under U.S. law. It’s called a recall because that’s the term used by the legislation delegated to the NHTSA by the Congress:

https://www.nhtsa.gov/sites/nhtsa.gov/files/documents/unders...

The only confusion I see on this point is from people who based on their history appear to be Tesla fans and presumably are letting their loyalties to the company trigger a defensive reaction.

only if you could find people who have their way with words

But that must be confusing for them too...

It’s very mildly confusing but it would be more confusing to change the name. There are systems in place to ensure recall fixes are performed and consumers take recalls very seriously, so they will take action to ensure it’s updated (OTA isn’t infallible). Overreacting is better than under-reacting.

"Technically correct - the best kind"

From the article:

> Tesla began issuing an “over-the-air software remedy” to certain vehicles on Tuesday, safety officials said. The remaining vehicles will receive software updates later, and all updates will be free for the cars’ owners.

I was confused as to why Tesla needs to "recall" when they can do OTA update. The title is misleading

surprise

It's because the NHTSA forced them into a safety related "recall". It's not just a regular OTA update.

Tesla has a long history of being dishonest about Autopilot capabilities and dangers, and it's killed several people so far. The NHTSA is forcing them to make some tweaks.

(Not arguing that autopilot is on the whole any more or less safe than human drivers. Just that Tesla has a history of misrepresentation.)

> It's because the NHTSA forced them into a safety related "recall". It's not just a regular OTA update.

And how does this "recall" work? Is it physically taking the car to a branch to apply the update? I'm curious to know.

It can be over the air but calling it a recall also brings notification requirements and means that if you bring it in to the service department they’ll do it for you, too.

It's an OTA update, as you know. It's great that they can do this.

It's just a semantic thing. I think the actual mechanism (that there is a regulatory body that can force auto makers to improve safety, whether OTA or in the shop) is cool, but I agree that the word "recall" is confusing. It's just a holdover from old processes. Maybe the terminology will change in time. Probably not.

No. Recall is a legal term, and just means Tesla is required by law to fix a defect. And that certain penalties and duties apply to them. The recall can be totally remote.

You know some "recalls" have a required fix of "throw the thing away" right? Recall just means the government is making you do something to a giant subset of your product fleet, usually for safety reasons.

The only difference between a regular OTA update and this one is that you will also get a letter in your mailbox notifying you of this.

If you miss that letter in the mail or don’t read patchnotes, this recall OTA update will get autoinstalled just like any other regular OTA update without you even noticing anything special about it.

> Tesla has a long history of being dishonest about Autopilot capabilities and dangers, and it's killed several people so far. The NHTSA is forcing them to make some tweaks.

From the article:

> > The update will add new, more prominent visual alerts and checks for the Autosteer function, which is part of Autopilot. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said there may be “increased risk of a crash” when Autosteer is engaged and drivers do not “maintain responsibility for vehicle operation.”

I don't buy this. Tesla's driver monitoring during autosteer is among the most annoying in the industry, and it has even more protections than other systems (like how BlueCruise used to [maybe still does] allow you to take off your seatbelt without deactivating).

It's probably a negotiation they had, and that was the compromise they reached.

We all want 100% safe auto driving. We're not there yet. Tesla wants to pretend we are, the NHTSA doesn't, we end up with occasional situations like this where things get marginally safer and more annoying.

Just growing pains for a young industry, I hope.

It is a regular OTA update.

Negligent drivers have killed people, not autopilot capabilities. Take the example in the recent Washington Post article where a driver ran through a stop sign at a T intersection, left the road, and killed a bystander.

What the article didn't say is that the system reduced cruise set point to 45 mph due to the road type, but the driver was _holding down the accelerator pedal_ to maintain 60 mph as it flew through the stop sign. The driver admitted they knew they were responsible for the controlling the car.

What is your evidence that drivers not knowing Autopilot capabilities, and not intentional misuse by negligent drivers, killed several people?

It was an update forced by the NHTSA after an investigation and negotiation.

1. Every time one of these articles comes out, the investigation concludes 10 months later that the driver was at fault.

2. The hero metric is what is the rate of crashes _compared to the general population not using Autopilot_.

Tesla make it abundantly clear that the driver is still responsible for monitoring. This is analogous to a dev just deploying copy-pasted code from ChatGPT without checking it. You still supervise/monitor the result.

That's because legally, they are. However, it hasn't stopped Tesla from doing things like hold press conferences (in the case of a fatal collision with a Semi) to talk about how the car had warned the driver to hold the steering wheel, and neglect the trifling detail that it had done that once, and it was eighteen minutes prior to the accident. Tesla will happily throw you under the bus to try to protect the reputation of FSD/AP.

> Tesla make it abundantly clear that the driver is still responsible for monitoring.

Tesla had to be dragged kicking and screaming into doing this. When AP first launched, the steering wheel checks were every fifteen minutes, then reduced to five. It has only been through repeated cajoling that it is down to where it is now.

Let's not forget that "The driver is only in the seat for legal purposes. The car is driving itself." is still on Tesla's website to this day. (And in a sense, it is accurate - the legal purposes just include trying to shield Tesla from as much liability as possible). Oh, and Smart Summon. "Bring your car to you while you deal with a fussy child" (and still maintain complete awareness of your car...)

> It is a regular OTA update

Tesla is mailing a letter to all affected owners about this. Does Tesla normally do that for regular OTA updates?

> What the article didn't say is that the system reduced cruise set point to 45 mph due to the road type, but the driver was _holding down the accelerator pedal_ to maintain 60 mph as it flew through the stop sign. The driver admitted they knew they were responsible for the controlling the car.

Do you have a source for that claim? The earlier news coverage said that the driver set the speed to 44mph, and that the data was unclear whether the autopilot or driver accelerated. If you have something like a court document that would be great to clarify.

That wasn't my comment, but I happened to have the source already open: https://twitter.com/Tesla/status/1734374558105293081?s=20

Thanks - I hadn’t seen more recent sources than the NYT story which had it at unclear a couple of years ago:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/17/business/tesla-autopilot-...

I thought Tesla was known for being dishonest about its FSD feature, not AutoPilot, which is a less ambitious lane keeping/auto cruise control feature?

Sorry, you're probably right. I have a hard time keeping track of their confusing names.

How many people have been killed by cruise control do you think?

> It's not just a regular OTA update

Thematically and semantically, sure, I agree, it isn’t.

Functionally, it is, as it installs just like any regular OTA update and doesn’t require the driver to do anything differently compared to a non-recall OTA update.

Because it’s a legally mandated thing. You know, because Tesla lies about bugs, features, and safety issues all the time.

> Tesla decided this month to voluntarily administer a recall.

Which means they chose not to contest the NHTSA.

NHtSA can force them to recall the cars, the "voluntary" part is to save face.

It’s not misleading. This is a NHTSA forced recall. That means something legally.

The automaker is required by law to correct it.

That does not mean the car must physically go in, it’s just that until recently that’s how everyone did it because they didn’t have OTA updates.

A recall is still a recall.

"Legally mandated OTA update" would not be misleading.

Yeah I was wondering about that too. I got a software update that seemed to add auto steer to my non-self-driving model y. I tried it a few times on the highway but it seemed erratic (switching off randomly and dangerously engaging regenerative brakes in the fast lane). Won’t be trying again until next update (if it sticks in the car).

edit: corrected autopilot (cruise control) -> self driving

I don't own a Tesla but when I was a kid we had Sega Channel and I remember waking up on the first day of a new cycle, excited to see what games had randomly been chosen to be listed. This is how I imagine update day going with a Tesla lol "Did they include any exciting features? Take anything good away? Gotta wake up and go find out!"

I hope this is in jest, and I’m assuming it is. The fact that this is even allowed to happen is bewildering to me. The fact that the car can perform totally different from one day to the next because of an OTA update you knew nothing about is insane. Even if there are UI notifications on the 65” TV in the console, NOBODY reads them. They just scroll through and click accept/okay as quickly as possible. They are already late for work, and still have to drop off the ankle biters at daycare. “Sorry boss, but I would have been here on time if I hadn’t been forced to read a new EULA on my car”

IDK, there've been a lot of nice quality of life improvements in those updates over the years. Eg, moving wiper controls to the buttons and configurable quick controls. The cameras have improved quite a bit from software updates too. And obviously there are more basic things too, such as updates to media apps and better integration with MyQ garage door openers.

When you buy a Tesla you are signing up for this. Some people don't like it but many do. (Most of these changes are genuine improvements.) There are plenty of competitors out there if you prefer to go without such a feature.

Are you a new Tesla owner?

> I got a software update that seemed to add auto steer to my non-autopilot model y.

All (edit: new since 2019) Teslas come with autopilot. “Full self driving” is an add on.

> I tried it a few times on the highway but it seemed erratic (switching off randomly and dangerously engaging regenerative brakes in the fast lane)

“Switching off” usually means that it can’t identify the lane it’s supposed to be in. Was this some sort of a rural highway, a highway under construction, and/or a poorly maintained road?

The braking is called “phantom braking”, and (since a very good update in spring 2022) usually only occurs when there is some sort of substantial deceptive visual issue like oil lines, asphalt sealant, a reflection of the sun, or visual mirages (when the road looks shiny/reflective due to temp diffs).

For me personally, phantom braking only happens on a couple of (crappy) roads at certain spots for me, so I just don’t use AP at those spots.

In general, AP is super consistent. Other than an overdone name, it works really well. If it was just called “advanced cruise control”, people wouldn’t be shitting themselves over the feature. It’s just adaptive cruise control with lane assist, two features that many cars have, and Teslas happens to have implemented quite well (imho).

You literally just described every defining feature of California roads.

> You literally just described every defining feature of California roads.

Eh… it has to be egregious.

I live in California, and I only have problems on two spots between Bakersfield and Barstow. The rest are literal construction sites with unmarked lanes.

Other than that, I have no issues 99% of the time I use AP when driving in NorCal in the Bay Area and surrounding areas (Napa/Sonoma to the north, Sacramento to the east, and SLO to the south). I use AP a lot, so I feel confident stating how reliable it is in these areas.

If someone finds that it doesn’t work for them in one of these areas, I’d almost guarantee that it’s in a specific spot for a specific reason.

Actually the name is not overdone itself, as autopilot is a simple airplane software that keeps it on a line basically. Funny how Tesla hype gave it more clever meaning.

I've been driving an M3 since 2020 and have put 40k miles on it, mostly over road trips throughout California and the western half of the US.

Phantom braking has always been a bit of an issue -- when I first got the car, I just wouldn't use cruise control in heavy traffic, but felt ok using it once out of a city. In the past year or so, it's been so bad I'm scared to use it at all, and I've filed multiple complaints with the NHTSA. I'll be driving on I-80 through Nevada or Utah and every ~10 minutes the car will slam on its brakes. This is dry, consistently lit, consistent colors, minimal bridges casting shadows, etc.

I wish there was a way to make my cruise control "dumb"/non-adaptive just to stop the random abrupt braking in the middle of nowhere.

Are most those 40k miles in the last year or so?

> I just wouldn't use cruise control in heavy traffic

Assuming you’re staying in one lane for a bit, AP actually shines in heavy traffic (especially stop and go).

> I'll be driving on I-80 through Nevada or Utah and every ~10 minutes the car will slam on its brakes.

Two points:

1. The update I spoke of was in spring 2022. AP improved a lot with that update for me. Shadows stopped triggering phantom braking. Trucks driving it adjacent opposite lanes on highways stopped triggering phantom braking. It took away the most egregious errors, imho. So if you’re talking about trips mostly before the spring 2022 update, i can believe it. If it’s after spring 2022, then…

2. Nevada can have lots of reflection mirages due to desert heat. Not sure about Utah, but it wouldn’t surprise me if that was the cause there as well (if it happened have the 2022 update).

I have my criticisms of teslas as cars and as a company, but autopilot is not one of them.

> I wish there was a way to make my cruise control "dumb"/non-adaptive just to stop the random abrupt braking in the middle of nowhere.

Agreed. This is one feature I hope that they are forced to make.

My biggest use case of it would be when it’s raining. AP still forces auto wipers when it’s raining, and it often runs too long (when there is no more rain) and/or too fast.

Of course, since I live in CA, rain is rarely an issue.

The absence of regular cruise control in my Model S Plaid is incredibly frustrating on road trips, particularly since Traffic-Aware Cruise Control (TACC) maxes out at 90 MPH - which is the speed limit on at least one U.S. road. Moreover, if the camera can’t see to its satisfaction, TACC’s maximum speed is even lower.

Camera can’t see ≠ I can’t see perfectly well. It’s dangerous to not have cruise control available at speeds that keep you with the flow of traffic.

Also, autopilot having a maximum speed of 85 MPH makes it essentially unusable on many interstates, where the speed limit is 80 MPH and the flow of traffic is 90 MPH.

So dumb.

That's weird, I've had a Model 3 since 2018 and it definitely used to have some issues with phantom braking, but for the last ~year it seems to be totally fixed (at least for highway driving, still sometimes gets confused on surface roads). Even in the past though I never had anything close to what you're describing where the car slams on the brakes every 10 minutes in good conditions.

Are you running an old software version? You might try bringing it in for service because what you're describing definitely doesn't seem right.

Auto-pilot is not on all Teslas as it was a paid upgrade til mid-2019. My M3 does not have auto-pilot!

Thanks. Fixed.

I didn’t realize early M3s didn’t have it.

I meant self-driving haha. Had it for 2 years but the names are still confusing. I'm like 99% sure autopilot did no steering before this update. Now it will try to go around curves on its own, but as I said it was randomly turning off (engaging the brakes unless you press the accelerator)... similar to the phantom braking stuff before but more shocking because it's steering too.

I think at some point the absurdity of the numbers (now it's 2M, soon it'll be 10M, 50M, ...) will become so great that NHTSA will stop calling this a "recall", and then this term will no longer be usable for clickbait article titles. Absurdity because it'll get harder and harder to imagine how a company might bring in millions and millions of vehicles in for service repeatedly, from a logistics and cost perspective, and still be able to grow and make a good profit.

>and then this term will no longer be usable for clickbait article titles.

It's not clickbait, that's ridiculous. The essence of the article is the results of the investigation. NHSTA has a process, they investigated and issued a recall. The fact that it can be fixed OTA doesn't change the intent of what's happening. I mean, at what point does the first comment stop being, "It's not a recall!" Who cares.

I'm more interested in the obvious questions, like: does the update actually make anything safer? If it's so easy, why didn't Tesla do it on their own?

> If it's so easy, why didn't Tesla do it on their own?

It's situations like this that make me not trust Tesla and Musk. I always feel like they're misrepresenting the vehicle's capabilities, and I have no idea what I'm actually getting in terms of autopilot capabilities.

When I rode in a friend's Tesla, the real time display of the sensors did not inspire confidence. It missed a lot of cars and pedestrians.

I think the technology has a lot of transformative potential, but between their continuous hype over substance, ripping out lidar to be cheap, etc., it's just really hard to trust them.

> I'm more interested in the obvious questions, like: does the update actually make anything safer? If it's so easy, why didn't Tesla do it on their own?

Tesla has advertised many features which do not work reliably or, in some cases, at all. If they don’t want to admit that, they’re going to resist - especially if it’s going to fuel a class action lawsuit claiming that this feature is not in the state it was sold as.

The NHTSA does not have that conflicting set of incentives.

It is clickbait. Tesla hasn't "recalled" 2M vehicles, they're pushing a software patch. "Recall" is specifically jargon. It's a regulatory action. However (and this is precisely why this headline is clickbait) it has an alternate, more common meaning to the general population, which is "your car has a defective part, is unreliable, and needs to be brought in to have that part replaced."

This is a "recall" the same way your code needs a "recall" when you find a bug. It's not.

"your car has a defective part, *is unreliable*, and needs to be brought in to have that part replaced.".

Precisely! NHTSA determined that these vehicles are unreliable in this specific case, and thus need fixing. Glad we're on the same page. :-)

(I know, you want to pretend that it only ever means "physical repair" in everyone's mind, but that's a pretty big projection on your part.)

You not being aware of the use of the term doesn’t mean it’s clickbait. All a recall means is that the NHTSA is using its legal authority to have Tesla ensure that all vehicles with a safety concern are fixed. If Tesla can ship an update that easily, they can send the NHTSA a report showing each VIN having been verified as having the right firmware version.

NHSTA needs to reevaluate the usage of “recall” in situations where nothing is being physically recalled to the manufacturer’s facilities. It is only confusing people.

There are much clearer ways to phrase what has occurred like “Regulators force Tesla to issue mandatory OTA update to address issues with auto pilot”

Sorry, but do all teslas have starlink or whatever satellite provided connections? Are all cars connected to the internet? Until that happens, I want a recall that _can_ be fixed by an OTA update called a recall.

Because for sure my parents' next car will have OTA capacity, but also be disconnected by my dad. If it needs a software update, that vehicle will be driven to a garage. If you don't issue a recall anymore, it'll be dangerous.

Tesla gets to address recalls via OTA software updates right up to the point where they can not. Then, as you note, 2M+ vehicles needing physical replacement parts or rework will kill them because they have no way to do that. EVs are simple enough that they might avoid that scenario entirely.

But imagine one of those massive castings developing cracks and needing some reinforcements welded on in the field, or really any part. FEA is probably the most important tech that Tesla is dependent on.

Just because a manufacturer applies a fix OTA doesn’t make it not a recall. Recall is just a term. Regulators issue the recall. How the manufacturer performs the fix can vary.

Yeah, but it is plainly obvious that “recall” is a loaded term here. Yes, it is strictly true that it is the name for the thing that regulators are saying— But nothing is getting “recalled” in the literal meaning of the word. “Tesla ships mandatory software update OTA to address bug” is much more accurate to how this affects real people.

It is loaded. It means a critical safety issue has been found by the government and they’re forcing it to be fixed. That comes with various timeline and notification requirements.

That’s all it means.

Whether or not you have to drive to a specific building to get it done is not and never has been a requirement of the recall process. That’s just how automakers have done it, mostly out of lack of OTA and unwillingness to send techs to invidual peoples houses.

We need a different word. This is not a recall.

Software update with a critical fix?

How would you manage this? If a recall is ordered, and a OTA update is possible… undo the recall and change the name of the recall…?

Again there’s no way for the regulator to know how the recall should be fixed. It makes no sense to give it a different name just to appease the semantics of not actually driving the car to a shop to fix the problem.

Why, what harm is being caused by using this one?

They will never put "software update" and "recall" in the same headline. That will defeat the purpose of their headline, which is to make Tesla look bad.

Words matter. "Recall" had a very specific meaning in the past before OTA updates: your vehicle was recalled to the dealership to be retrofitted for safety reasons, which is obviously very inconvenient for the owner of the vehicle. These OTA "recalls" are safety issues too, but the wording still implies the inconvenience of dropping your car off to be altered by a mechanic, which is not the case. New terminology would be preferable.

Contact your congressional representatives and let them know that you feel strongly about this word. The NHTSA has been delegated authority to ensure the safety of the American vehicle fleet and the official name for the process where a manufacturer makes sure they notify every purchaser that a defect needs to be corrected uses that term.

There’s not much to debate in convenience vs safety...

It’s an implied inconvenience (taking the car in) that doesn’t actually exist (people aren’t actually taking their cars in), vs accurately conveying a public safety message (the recall indicated the car needs to be fixed). OTA updates aren’t infallible. It’s safer to be over cautious.

It means a critical safety issue has been found by the government and they’re forcing it to be fixed.

Manufacturers can initiate recalls, they aren't always, or mostly, issues found by the NHTSA. They are required to report them to the NHTSA who track and monitor them. I wouldn't say they are necessarily "critical" either. Here is the list of recalls for a 2005 Toyota Camry, for example.

https://www.autosafety.org/vehicle-safety-check/2005-toyota-...

In reality, it's like someone being given the opportunity to retire before being fired. It's a polite chance to take ownership rather than it being forced. Apparently Tesla has to be forced.

As an owner with Auto Pilot I don't know how to feel. It's most likely just going to make the product more annoying / less useful rather than inherently safer.

I mean, you can't install radar through an OTA, so... :(

The term is rightfully loaded, and it is being used correctly. The hazard being an OTA patchable software issue doesn't soften the risk, so why soften the language?

Because having one word mean two different things is less clear than having two words that mean two different things.

Except that the word, "recall", doesn't have two different meanings. It literally means the same thing here as it does for a recall wherein a Jeep has to have its shifter replaced / tweaked / whatever.

Just so happens that the latter can't be fixed via software, because it's not a software-based safety failure.

The former is fixable via software update, because it is a software-based safety failure.

Both, however, are safety failures. Both need to be fixed. Both situations incurred regulatory requirements to notify customers and provide a timely fix at no cost to affected customers, whether within or without the vehicle's warranty.

In short: both are recalls, and recall means the same thing in both cases: notify, fix, or face regulatory consequences.

> Except that the word, "recall", doesn't have two different meanings.

To the car owner who has to deal with a “recall”, it functionally does.

One type of a recall requires you to drive to a dealership/service center and leave your car there while the issue is being resolved. The other type requires you to do nothing aside from just waiting for the OTA update to install.

There’s a reason software uses a floppy disk as the icon for save. The fact that a recall doesn’t involve driving the car to a dealer to have the fix applied is completely irrelevant to what recall actually means.

I think the difference is with any other manufacturer an announced recall means you are scheduling a service appointment with the dealership, taking time off work, finding a babysitter, doing the rental agreement paperwork if it is a lengthy fix, etc...

With Tesla no action on your end is required. The car will download the fix and apply it automatically.

Yes, I am aware. I have no issues with using the word “recall” for this either, as long as it is clarified that it is resolved through OTA and doesn’t require a drive to a dealership.

And that’s because most people have no idea that recalls resolved trough OTA are even a thing. Makes sense to me that a lot of people wouldn’t be aware, since OTA updates aren’t entirely common in cars yet.

As for “why”, since “it is still a recall, the only difference is how it is addressed”? Because to an actual person dealing with a recall, it makes a significant difference whether they gotta drive somewhere and leave their car there to get fixed vs. their car autoupdating OTA overnight while the car is parked safely at home.

I appreciate the clarification here. I read this headline this morning and it made me think they had to "(physically) recall 2M vehicles" as-in take them off the road completely.

With a cup of coffee it feels a bit more like "take them into a service center to fix them" but even that is far larger than the truth.

That’s not how recalls usually work anyways. The cars aren’t pulled off the road. You usually get a letter or email then schedule a service. Happened with my Outback a few years ago… some battery drain thing. I took it in a few months after getting the email.

Yeah, like I said. After coffee I realized it wasn't them being pulled off the road like when a drug or food is recalled. I've received those letters, but the wording of the headline made it seem like the whole vehicle was recalled on the surface, and it was what I assumed until I took a second to think about it and realize it was likely a letter in the mail and a service center visit, but in reality it is even less. Just a software patch that is basically invisible to the user.

I commented on a post on X stating about the recall. I said that it's an OTA. But many people said technically it's a recall.

Is it? I don't see android "recalling" android devices every update.

Yes, it is. A recall is about the fact that there are unsafe devices, not about how they get fixed.

> A recall is issued when a manufacturer or NHTSA determines that a vehicle, equipment, car seat, or tire creates an unreasonable safety risk or fails to meet minimum safety standards

Yeah, technically it is called a recall because of NHTSA's terminology. But it's not a recall in traditional sense. It's an OTA, where customer's cars don't have to be physically recalled.

Android is not the agent there. A phone manufacturer could and should recall devices they send out if they turn out to have some serious flaw.

It's fine if they can push the update remotely, but if it's something that warrants a recall they should at least check with everyone that they managed to install the update.

Of course by now we've accepted security bugs as just the normal state of things, so it's hard to think of something serious enough to warrant a recall. An overheating battery perhaps, assuming it can be solved with a software update.

> The update will add new, more prominent visual alerts and checks for the Autosteer function, which is part of Autopilot.

Nothing was actually broken but regulators just insist on more alerts and Tesla just implemented those and is rolling them out with a routine software update. But that's a less dramatic headline.

Actual recalls are less frequent unless there is a hardware problem like the wheels falling of a toyota: https://electrek.co/2022/06/23/toyota-recalls-bz4x-electric-...

Some, manufacturers of course don't have the ability to do OTA updates for their cars and need to recall the car to perform software updates. Especially firmware of components sourced from third parties (e.g. engine software) is usually a bit more tricky. Even with manufacturers that do have OTA updates, it's often limited to just the entertainment software.

Tesla doesn't have that issue because they design components in house and don't have a lot of external software suppliers (if any at all). So, they can fix just about any software issue with over the air updates and make the car better over time. Some of the Chinese EV manufacturers do the same. But more manufacturers should do that.

This is a very biased reading of things.

"Tesla recall: nothing actually broken"

"Other manufacturer recalls: wheels falling off"

If I look at the recalls for my cars, they're far more mundane. "A passenger detection module may not detect a passenger. The vehicle will automatically deploy air bags in that seat position". "The passenger side camera may get foggy in cold weather".

And I don't think throwing shade at Toyota there helps a lot. Perhaps remember that Tesla has shipped vehicles with missing brake pads, unglued windshields, etc.

Yup

A bad if/else is equivalent to a broken physical part if it controls a physical part.

Also, these OTAs have a habit of breaking other things on my car along the way. It's just slop all the way through.

the fact that it can be easily modified OTA is a red flag enough that Tesla is pushing software out without the same level of testing hardware does. shipping a MVP in the hopes it doesn't' cause an accident isn't exactly best practice.

You clearly don't know what recall means as your statement is completely wrong. The recall is not equivalent to how it's resolved. You could turn that into an arrow instead. I.e. due to the recall, Tesla is pushing an ota that will address the safety concerns.

To help you better understand in the future:

> A recall is issued when a manufacturer or NHTSA determines that a vehicle, equipment, car seat, or tire creates an unreasonable safety risk or fails to meet minimum safety standards.

I think they wrote this _technically true_ but falsely framed headline just because they are so angry with Elon.

"Government Regulators Force Tesla to Add New Warning Language to Autopilot Software" would be so much more accurate, but wouldn't have the same negative connotation

Yea thats my take too.. he's stepping on toes and trying to remove the undue influence advertisers and others have on free speech. I hope it works. Twitter should be exporting the first amendment to the rest of the world - prudes and religious sensibilities be damned.

The recall report: https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/rcl/2023/RCLRPT-23V838-8276.PDF

This recall is specifically targeted at the system that monitors if the driver is paying attention.

Thank you, the report itself is more useful than most of the news articles.

TBH, this sounds like... not much. The alerts will be louder and more prominent, and maybe it can't be turned on close to stop signs or traffic lights now. Not that engaging it there was normal before. :shrug

The so-called "FSD" feature seems to be unaffected, since its operational domain was already different.

So when is Toyota (the only other system I have experience with) going to be recalled? Their system is worse than Tesla's and will just randomly disable itself with zero alerts.

> will just randomly disable itself with zero alerts.

That's how it encourages the driver to pay attention!

Such OTA's by auto makers should be required to be reviewed by a 3rd party. A bad update can kill people.

I assume OTAs for planes have a strict process defined or approved by the FAA which needs to be followed. Does the NTSB have such a thing in place or is it just the wild west?

Better yet, how about some dumb cars where you can't be killed by software code... there's no need for all these computers in cars these days. Keep it simple stupid. I think they just want to inflate the prices so much with all these extra useless features to force unequal access to personal transport.

It's all about cost-effective improvement in sellable stats. Getting a little more horsepower; handling a little better; braking a little better. Easier to do with software than some mechanical device.

Conspiracy theories aren't necessary. Just regular competitive market forces will explain it.

It's not a conspiracy theory when cars are so expensive whole classes of people are excluded from the market.

Dupe? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38625652

Seriously, why can't the headline just say "Tesla to issue Autopilot software update for 2M vehicles"?

As if the purpose of the headline is just to make people think this is a massive product recall.

Because it is a recall, and your suggested headline would be misleading.

Tesla routinely pushes software updates. This one, however, is different. It’s the result of a multi-year NHTSA investigation, and it’s legally a recall.

The National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act gives NHTSA the authority to require manufacturers to recall vehicles that have safety-related defects. Just because this recall is being addressed through an OTA software update doesn’t make it not a recall.

Because "they" are pissed at Elon and his antics. He destroyed their propaganda platform and exposed the propaganda pushers. Now he's shitting on advertisers for extorting the platform. A story like this has an effect on stock prices. It's all they can do to try to hurt him since he has so much "fuck you" money.

I'm surprised by the inability of many HN'ers to understand what a "recall" means. How you fix it doesn't matter. OTA or dealer visit recall is a recall.

From my Model Y manual:

"Autosteer is intended for use on controlled-access highways with a fully attentive driver. Do not use Autosteer in construction zones, or in areas where bicyclists or pedestrians may be present."

GM and Ford both restrict their systems to controlled access highways, and are hands free when doing so. I wish Tesla would do something similar.

"Owner notification letters will be mailed in accordance with 49 C.F.R. § 577.7." That's a lot of mail...

What is that, a quarter million min in postage alone?

That is what a company like this calls "budget dust"

It's so stupid. Or... they could just display the change notes on the dash when they push a software update.

Here’s the actual legal requirement:

> In the case of a notification required to be sent by a motor vehicle manufacturer, by certified mail, verifiable electronic means such as receipts or logs from electronic mail or satellite distribution system, or other more expeditious and verifiable means to all dealers and distributors of the vehicles that contain the defect or noncompliance.

I think that would cover them having a pop up on the dashboard as long as they were confident that the driver couldn’t miss it and they could log that it was seen.

Level 2 and 3 automation are just not something you can reasonably expect humans to be able to participate in. If you're not providing input you're not going to be paying enough attention.

https://www.synopsys.com/automotive/autonomous-driving-level...

At least we can all safely agree that naming things is hard.

To be rolled out in "2023.44.30" -- soon as part of the annual holiday update, which will get hype as a holiday update instead of a recall.

Nicely planned from a PR perspective. :)

in other news the world's 50 billion-ish Linux, Windows and Apple devices have also all been "recalled" hundreds of times in the last few years alone

I too enjoy putting "quotes" around a word to make it seem like it means the thing I want to pretend it means, instead of engaging honestly with the actual situation. :-)

Regulators forced them to update their product to mitigate a safety issue that was found? Or maybe you are misunderstanding the correct usage of ‘recall’ in the article and are applying it incorrectly to other situations.

Updates, not recalls. A software update shouldn't be called a recall.

It should when it's required by the NHTSA and comes along with mandatory reporting, notification, and deadline obligations, along with optional free on-site execution of the fix.

That's what makes it a recall. A software update is the mechanism, the recall is the "Tesla did something wrong and is being held accountable" part.

I'm not saying it shouldn't count as a recall, but for the consumer it's just an update.

I'm not sure there is a need for a distinction here, legally it is considered a recall whether or not it can be resolved with an update.

I meant the title of the article probably should have used the term "update". To someone like me who doesn't know anything about vehicles, I was totally confused to see Tesla "recalling" vehicles over software.

[dupe]

More here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38625652

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