U.S. regulators request additional information in Tesla (TSLA) autopilot investigation

Documents released to the media Tuesday show The National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration (NHTSA) has sent a special order to electric automaker, Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) with questions concerning changes to the company’s driver monitoring system employed in their autopilot software.

In a notice dated July 26th, the NHTSA expressed concerns about a Tesla update which allows drivers to use the autopilot feature for a longer period of time without requiring the driver to exert force on the steering wheel.

"The resulting relaxation of controls...could lead to greater driver inattention and failure of the driver to properly supervise Autopilot," NHTSA said in its letter.

The agency is looking into how well Autopilot performs after finding more than a dozen instances where Tesla cars crashed into stationary emergency vehicles. They're also checking whether Tesla's vehicles effectively make sure that drivers are paying attention when they use the driver assistance system.

In June 2022, the NHTSA elevated a previous investigation involving 830,000 Tesla vehicles to an engineering analysis - a necessary step before they could potentially ask for a recall. Last month, the NHTSA requested updated responses and current data from Tesla as part of the investigation.

Autopilot is designed to let cars automatically steer, accelerate, and brake while staying in their lane. Enhanced Autopilot can even help with changing lanes on highways.

Tesla was ordered to respond to the request by August 25th, or risk fines of up to $26,315 per day.

Shares of TSLA are up 7.38% in afternoon trading Tuesday.

By Michael Elkins | [email protected]

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