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Comment by stahtops | Hacker News Reader

How do you square this with the article?

It states that consumer reports, (a for profit company providing independent reviews, and not a regulatory body) said the Model 3 stopping distance was not good. Allegedly due to a “bad ABS calibration”. Tesla released an OTA SW update.

Why wasn’t the bad calibration and degraded performance caught by regulators testing automobile safety standards?

The article also posits that this ability to make OTA updates expands the (IMO very very bad) SWE perspective that “it’s OK to ship unfinished and buggy products” into safety critical systems.

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The role of US regulators in the automotive industry is pretty different from what you seem to be expecting. They see their main goal is to set minimum, testable benchmarks for safety and give manufacturers freedom to achieve that in any reasonably justifiable way. The consequence of this is that almost nothing is required beyond meeting FMVSS and passing the tests it prescribes. ABS stopping distance is one of those tests, but a quick glance at the CR tests doesn't look like an FMVSS failure. The stopping distance simply wasn't up to industry norms.

Another consequence is that ISO-26262 and most other standards are completely, 100% norm-based in the US. They're used because the industry expects them, not because there's a legal requirement. You can deviate all you want and the only consequence is that regulators might take a closer look at your paperwork in the event of issues because they look unusual.

Ah interesting, I wonder if Tesla is an exception and if their systems do in fact follow ISO 26262. Standards are not necessarily legal requirements, and not necessarily checked by external people.

It sounds like their ABS system wasn't designed as carefully as conventional systems if there was such poor braking performance. Reading around, it might have been related to the emergency brake assist functionality not being calibrated properly.

Consumer reports is a non-profit last I checked

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