Plaintiffs in a new, proposed class-action suit against Tesla Inc. claim that Elon Musk's company made and advertised false claims about the autopilot and full self-driving (FSD) features on Tesla vehicles. The suit, filed in federal court in San Francisco, follows a series of complaints against Tesla filed by the California DMV saying the company made falsely inflated statements about the driver-assistance capabilities of Tesla vehicles.
The complaint alleges that, as early as 2016, Musk and Tesla Inc. were making claims that the autopilot and FSD features were "just around the corner" when the technologies were not ready and posed serious safety hazards to drivers and passengers. These statements, according to the complaint, were a marketing ploy to reel in buyers and investors and establish dominance in the electric vehicle market.
Of the allegedly defective technologies, Tesla has given warnings that both the Autopilot and the FSD features require a driver to remain fully attentive while the vehicle is in motion. But they have also said that vehicles in FSD mode will adhere to local traffic laws and traffic signals, while vehicles can accelerate, brake, and steer independently while in a traffic lane.
The class-action suit seeks unspecified damages for all persons who have either purchased or leased a Tesla vehicle since 2016, whereas the suit by the California DMV may require Tesla to make restitution to drivers or even have its California license suspended.
Editor's Note: The Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) has created a 0 (No Automation) to 5 (Full Automation) scale describing the ability of cars to complete regular driving tasks. For example, cruise control is a level 1 feature; it assists drivers in maintaining speed, but still requires drivers for other critical driving functions, such as acceleration and deceleration. Tesla's statements that its vehicles are equipped with "autopilot" imply that the vehicles are capable of full automation. As of September 2022, no vehicles above level 2 are available to the public, including Teslas. This case, however, is not the first time Tesla has come under scrutiny for statements about its vehicle capabilities. In August 2021, two senators sent a letter to the Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) expressing their concerns over the naming of the software, and requesting the FTC to open an investigation into "Tesla's repeated and overstated claims about their Autopilot and Full Self-Driving features and take appropriate enforcement action". When naming a product, manufacturers have a duty to fairly represent the nature of that product and its capabilities.
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