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Transportation Technology

Autonomous Cruise Car Encounter With Police Raises Policy Questions (techcrunch.com) 74

An anonymous reader shares a report: No technology is perfect. Even self-driving cars trained to obey traffic laws are bound to run into issues that cause them to commit a citable offense. Such was the case with a Cruise-operated hatchback in San Francisco last weekend, which was pulled over by local law enforcement for failing to switch on its headlights. While the car came to a stop, as video of the incident shows, there's policy to be established when it comes to interactions between autonomous vehicles and police. Originally published on Instagram, the video shows the car -- one of Cruise's Chevy Cruises -- in the city's Richmond District pulling over to the side of the road when signaled to do so by an officer, ahead of an intersection. The policeperson walks toward the car and attempts unsuccessfully to open the driver-side door, at which point the Cruise vehicle begins to drive down the road -- only to pull over again and activate its hazards. Police approach the car a second time in a presumed effort to figure out how to turn on the headlights.

Cruise, which a little over two months ago began letting San Francisco residents hail rides in its driverless vehicles, asserts that the pulled-over vehicle acted as intended. The headlights indeed malfunctioned -- and have been fixed, according to the company -- but the car yielded to police and then pulled over to the "nearest safe location." One of the officers contacted Cruise after the traffic stop, and no citation was issued. But the episode raises questions about procedure where self-driving vehicles are involved with the police.

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Autonomous Cruise Car Encounter With Police Raises Policy Questions

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  • We all know cops don't bend and won't allow any basic human behavior around them.

    I am not sure what we can do here? Stop all progress because dumb cops aren't appeased?

    • Perhaps the self-driving car manufacturers could meet law enforcement half way, and provide an Oculus headset in the trunk of these driverless vehicles. That way, if so inclined, the detaining officer could kick the virtual shit out of any character of his/her choosing.

  • by jd ( 1658 ) <imipakNO@SPAMyahoo.com> on Monday April 11, 2022 @04:00PM (#62437486) Homepage Journal

    ...had driven off when a cop was trying to open the door, they'd likely be swiss cheese a short time later. Given that motherboards are easy to replace and there are no ethical considerations, it would seem that this SOP would be more applicable not less.

    • The odds of Joe Random Sixshooter cop being able to aim at the processor unit of an autonomous vehicle, and being able to hit it ... are pretty slender.

      That's assuming there is one single processor, not multiple processors interacting to produce the intended (and unintended) behaviours.

    • by necro81 ( 917438 )

      If a human had driven off when a cop was trying to open the door, they'd likely be swiss cheese a short time later.

      Johnny Cab [youtube.com] had it coming!

    • If the autonomous car is black, does it have a higher chance of getting shot?

  • by Tablizer ( 95088 ) on Monday April 11, 2022 @04:03PM (#62437508) Journal

    ...central roboCar control (CRCC) center and have them instruct the car to head back to the repair shop after dropping off the passenger? There's no need to physically interact with the vehicle once it's known it's a roboCar (and the passenger hasn't pressed 911.)

    If the danger of bad lights is too big, the CRCC can have the passenger get out to ride home with the cop, and the roboCar can either wait for a tow, or head back to the shop depending on safety tradeoffs.

    • ...central roboCar control (CRCC) center and have them instruct the car to head back to the repair shop after dropping off the passenger? There's no need to physically interact with the vehicle once it's known it's a roboCar (and the passenger hasn't pressed 911.)

      If the danger of bad lights is too big, the CRCC can have the passenger get out to ride home with the cop, and the roboCar can either wait for a tow, or head back to the shop depending on safety tradeoffs.

      That seems to be what happened (though the timeline is unclear), in fact the car taking off and then pulling over at another spot may have been due to remote operator intervention.

      At the same time keeping a list of operator phone numbers, id procedures, and interaction instructions is yet another thing the police (and office personnel) are going to have to keep track of.

      There probably needs to be some standardization put in place so these things act in a very predictable manner around emergency vehicles and

      • How about a QR code with contact information, you would only need to standardize what information needs to be included, as well as the size and location of the QR code on the vehicles.

        • Or...maybe...something human readable? ...like a phone number?

          you would only need to standardize what information needs to be included, as well as the size and location of the QR code on the vehicles.

          What if they put the vehicle license number on some sort of plate? ...and then affix that to some sort of standard location, maybe around the bumper(s)?

          JFC, not everything needs some sort of tech nerd gizmo solution.

        • by Tablizer ( 95088 )

          Maybe such info should be associated with the license plate in the DMV database. We can factor our "stickers" better...in theory. As a backup, require a physical sticker with phone# etc. be on the inside in case the network is wobbly.

    • Are you saying that tax-payers should foot the bill for the consequences of Cruise's equipment malfunctions? Why should the police take time out of their day to deal with Cruise's customers' inconvenience because Cruise made a faulty car?
      • by Tablizer ( 95088 )

        I'm not sure what you mean. Any car can malfunction.

        • And the police/tax payer don't pay for those either. That's the drivers' & manufacturers' responsibility, not the police's.
          • by Tablizer ( 95088 )

            I'm still confused about what you are comparing. Cops stop regular cars with broken headlamps also.

            In theory it could even be quicker for a cop to deal with a roboCar: key in the license plate, see that it's a roboCar, and press the "notify car dispatcher" button. The cop would never have to leave their patrol car, unlike dealing with traditional cars. (Or ask the cop station operator to do the contact.)

            • Let me remind you of what you wrote then, "...the CRCC can have the passenger get out to ride home with the cop..." - Free police taxi service?
              • by Tablizer ( 95088 )

                Oh, that. What does a cop do if a regular car has bad lights and is not permitted to drive home? I suppose their response depends on the jurisdiction's rules. But it's not a bot versus non-bot weighting that I see. Leaving a potentially vulnerable person(s) left to walk alone doesn't seem very civil.

                I would also hope the roboCar co. has an AAA-like service.

  • by slack_justyb ( 862874 ) on Monday April 11, 2022 @04:07PM (#62437528)

    The area one of these cars roams about is well known. Police in that area should have a wireless console that can remotely access the vehicle once they get within a particular range of it, like 20-30 feet or so. These cars can already detect the special IR signal within the police light bar, so adding something like a basic stop/pull over/indicate fault to company console that operates on something like a directed 5GHz radio should be the next step.

    For obvious reasons, the number of things the wireless console should be able to do should be really, really limited. Like police should be able to issue a command to a car within range to halt-go no further or slow and find nearest pullover notify when complete. Then the police should be able to issue a command that indicates something like "call your company, notify to callback (xxx)-xxx-xxxx, notify when complete." And that's about it. And the companies running these things should be issuing those consoles out as part of their ability to use the road.

    • Some kind of security does need to be included though, otherwise "road pirates" will halt those cars to steal from passengers, possibly even attack/kill them.

      • Why do autonomous cars need more security than regular cars, who will pull over for anyone with a set of police lights? Whether the car is autonomous or not doesn't matter for the attack you're describing. Since it's not common enough to be a problem already, I'm unsure on why it's necessary to retrofit every police cruiser in the country or start making cars refuse to pull over until someone from the ops center verifies them, presumably by then contacting the police ops and making them radio their officers
        • Maybe you missed the part where car manufacturers want to make self-driving cars without a steering wheel and pedals. You can't not stop nor can you get away from danger with such vehicles.

          And yes, an autonomous car is different in this case, because you're not the one deciding to stop for "the police" even if it happens to be thieves who have cloned police equipment designed to interact with autonomous cars, such as asking them to stop for "verification".

          People who have watched too much science-fiction kno

    • and get someone in an call center in South Sudan? or one with an 30+ wait time?

    • by dstwins ( 167742 )
      I disagree (well, partially).. they should be able provide a low range "pull over/notify company and respond" signal. but it should be tied to an activity (a robo car isn't going to run a light, exceed the speed limit or other "typical" motorist actions, and we presume the registration and insurance will remain up to date, so the only use case I can think of where this should happen is either warrant for the person or active investigation, both of which have identification numbers for them assigned.. so to
    • The area one of these cars roams about is well known. Police in that area should have a wireless console that can remotely access the vehicle once they get within a particular range of it, like 20-30 feet or so. These cars can already detect the special IR signal within the police light bar, so adding something like a basic stop/pull over/indicate fault to company console that operates on something like a directed 5GHz radio should be the next step.

      This was a car who's OS couldn't even detect that it was dark outside and turn the lights on.

  • by chas.williams ( 6256556 ) on Monday April 11, 2022 @04:09PM (#62437544)
    If the autonomous vehicle decides not to stop, are the police allowed to pursue?
    • Probably, at which point it could be considered a traffic hazard rather than a reckless driver. The police can pursue pretty much anything [youtu.be].
    • There was a case a decade ago in France with a Renault Vel Satis whose cruise control system disabled the brakes and started speeding on the highway. The car model didn't have a manually actionable handbrake either. The driver called the police, and the only thing they could do was clearing the way for the car to keep going without crashing into anything until it ran out of gas.

      source (2005 story) [expatica.com]

  • by Radical Moderate ( 563286 ) on Monday April 11, 2022 @04:15PM (#62437572)
    But the episode raises questions about procedure where self-driving vehicles are involved with the police.

    It also raises questions about why the car couldn't detect that its lights weren't working. Kind of big deal. Even if it doesn't rely on them to see in the dark, other drivers, and pedestrians, do, so they can see it.
    • This reminds me of one episode of Knight Rider, the prototype before K.I.T.T. didn't try to swerve to avoid a deer or something because it calculated that there would be no damage to the car from crashing into the deer.

    • It also raises questions about why the car couldn't detect that its lights weren't working. Kind of big deal.

      I believe the Chevy Cruise has manually operated headlights. In other words there is no data interface to tell the car they need to turn on. You must turn a knob. Whatever they did to bypass this was most likely broken. Either a servo to actuate the headlamp switch or a relay they added.

      So yeah, there should be a system to detect whether the bypass is actually working. I mean, I'd hate to think they press the break pedal, but then don't have a system to check that the car is actually slowing down or n

      • There may be a knob, but it's probably still CANbus.

        My truck has "knob" controls, but behind the scenes everything is connected to a Power Distribution Center (fuse/relay box) that controls everything via CAN input.

    • No questions about Police interaction need to be raised. Any deviation from regular interaction would have been detailed as part of the permit process. The real question is why the Police don't seem to understand what a regular interaction is supposed to look like.
    • by dstwins ( 167742 )
      I think you just answered your own question..

      Because the car DOESN'T need them (LIDAR and other cameras that have much higher sensitivity for low/no light), they most likely never bothered to put in a "check" for them.. since lets be honest, in the era of LED lights, failures are rare). And to be fair, it might have been at that dusk period where we all tend to forget to put on the lights due to enough ambient light that its not needed.. So they most likely had a sensor range fault. (but this is why they a
  • why not "police officer"? "police person" sounds ridiculous.
  • It looked to me like the car stopped just at an intersection, where it wasn't safe to sit, though about it for a second, then pulled through the intersection to a place where it was safe to sit.

    Which is what Cruise said it was supposed to do.

    Nothing to see here, boys and girls, except more click bait ads.

  • Even AI understands that the cops are asking something ridiculous or unsafe and tries to do the right thing. If there was a human driver that person would probably have been shot dead on the scene. Any time you do not follow orders, no matter how crazy those orders may be, you are resisting and might catch a beat-down or get shot.

  • This is what happens when you deploy onto hardware below spec. The software probably calls for automatic headlights and they were not installed for whatever reason (perhaps supply shortages, but could be bean counting).
  • by magzteel ( 5013587 ) on Monday April 11, 2022 @04:54PM (#62437750)

    There is a video where a cop wanted to pull over a woman. She put on the hazards and proceeded slowly because she thought it was an unsafe place to pull over. The cop decided to pit maneuver her car, and it flipped over. She was pregnant too.

    So wait for cops to start pit maneuvering driverless cars

    • by magzteel ( 5013587 ) on Monday April 11, 2022 @04:55PM (#62437752)

      Here's the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

      • With a bit more searching you will find that the Arkansaw Pit Maneuver by state police is no longer recommended in low speed chases.

        Jurisdictions will have to learn moving violations should just be mailed unless the driver is causing a danger to the public. 5-20 over the speed limit is not a danger to public, the even is a revenue collection event.

        https://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2021-11-19/arkansas-state-police-settles-in-suit-over-pursuit-maneuver

        Honestly a select few police departments are way t
        • by nzkbuk ( 773506 )
          It should only ever be used for low speed chases. As speed increases the chances that the car will roll increase
      • What in the actual fuck. If that happened in my country the policeofficer would be in jail.

        • Wow. I'm modded troll for pointing out that police outside of America a held accountable? Hell currently the public prosecutor is questioning if it was unreasonable for a police officer to discharge their firearm (no they didn't even hit anyone).

          Here's a troll post for you: Who the fuck gave that idiot moderator mod points.

  • fake cop / rent a cop can pull over and rape someone.
    So can a car check that the cop is real?
    Only stop at the police station?

    Also what is an safe area?
    the side of the road in death valley as it need to stop due to an bit dirt getting on an camera?
    Stop on top of the railroad tracks?
    Stop in the middle of an ramp? draw bridge? intersection? parking lot door?

  • What happens then? How do the police officially shut down the car until it can be towed? What's the procedure when:

    Police should be able to put a self driving car's tag into their system and order it to park itself and stand down from all operation, or even issue an emergency immediate shutdown.

    Then they can make whatever arrangements need to be made based on the circumstances.

  • "Dispatch, put me on the horn with the @#%$ operator of robo car license 123-XYZ. Drives like an @#%$."

    No software to learn or phone numbers to memorize, just a registry for every robo car company, with hefty fines if calls aren't answered within a minute.

  • I expect an autonomous car whose headlights or brakes are not working to refuse to move. It should test those first before it engages 1st gear.

  • Not in the US, but it seems odd to me no citation was issued . Would this TYPICALLY result in no citation being issued, is that at officer discretion and are they normally that discrete?
    • by PJ6 ( 1151747 )

      Not in the US, but it seems odd to me no citation was issued . Would this TYPICALLY result in no citation being issued, is that at officer discretion and are they normally that discrete?

      Many departments here in the US rely on fines, fees, and property forfeitures to fund their budgets.

      Depending on where you are, some areas really go out of their way to stick you with whatever citation they can.

  • There is a policy. The cops are supposed to phone Cruise and wait on hold like everyone else to talk to someone in India or Manila.

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