Scenario: Undocumented immigrant family in Minneapolis get in their Tesla car to go to work, school or shopping. The doors lock and are disabled via software OTA. Because they are not mechanical, the family can’t open the doors. They try to roll down a window, but that too is software controlled. The buttons do nothing. They are trapped.
The car then disables the steering colums via OTA software so the wheel goes limp. It is a drive by wire steering with no mechanical, rack and pinion physical link for the driver to control. Even the brakes are fully drive by wire so the driver can’t stop the car.
The cars autodrive engages and sends the trapped family to an ICE detention facility. In a panic the driver tries to turn off the car and finds that button is software controlled as well. The family find they are disconnected from their own car and are left with the choice of smashing a window and jumping out of a moving car, or to be sent to a processing facility for their concentration camp.
Is there any design feature stopping this from from hapening today?
Edit: In hindsight, it seems like this was the obvious design goal all along. The user has been completely disconnected from control of anything and it is to my understanding 100% drive by wire.
Edit 2: Another possibility is simple deactivation so people can’t drive out of an area. Imagine ICE sweep an area and deactivate all software controlled cars.
Maybe Trump wants to punish a region showing defiance and disable cars, or cause them to drive to pickup locations.
Edit 3: I’m also reminded of the internal cameras that can use facial recognition to identify undesirables and can either be remotely disabled and report undesirables for ICE pickup, or self-drive as stated earlier. It seems everything about this car is designed for dual use. Weaponizing a consumer good under the guise of features and convenience.
I’m not saying it’s a bad thought. I’m saying it doesn’t hold up to scrutiny… like… at all. So all you are doing is fearmongering.
Look at the front page of any newspaper today in the world. Then come back to tell me I’m fearmongering.
Don’t be an apologist for fascists.
I have.
You’re fearmongering.
This is like saying Elon Musk is planning to raise Godzilla from the depths of the oceans to round up immigrants. Saying “that is not a realistic thing to be worried about” isn’t being an apologist. It is having basic common sense.
No. This is saying ICE is rounding up immigrants. They absolutely are without question. I am also saying the people leading this, including Trump and Elon have particularly novel tools at their disposal that could be used in an unprecedented way.
That a megalomaniacle fascist billionaire built cars with clear dual use features is a clear and present danger that people need to be aware of. The risk is here.
If you had an ounce of common sense you would have said “yes. Good point, I hope it doesn’t come to that.” And we’d be done.
^ This is conspiracy nutjob statement.
I tried helping him too. He ain’t getting it.
We can’t pretend we haven’t seen American technology built with dual use, enshittification and geopolitical strategic power in mind. The US government themselves decry Chinese technology as a threat, when it only does exactly what American tech does. Now the safeguards of courts and democracy that prevented abuse of this are largely gone and this technological capability is controlled by openly fascist psychopaths, the threat is as real and in your face as it gets.
Well, you can pretend. Clearly everything is fine and there is nothing to see here according to you.