Feds Launch Safety Probe Into 2.6 Million Tesla’s Remote Summon Feature

In 2016, Elon Musk promised that Tesla owners would beryllium capable to “summon” their conveyance from anywhere, including having a car successful New York travel to its operator successful Los Angeles. In 2025, Tesla’s summon exertion is nether probe due to the fact that it keeps crashing into posts and parked cars. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced Tuesday that it volition motorboat a probe into 2.6 cardinal Tesla vehicles implicit information concerns related to the “Actually Smart Summon” feature.

The preliminary valuation of Tesla’s distant driving diagnostic follows aggregate reports of accidents involving Smart Summon and Actually Smart Summon. According to the NHTSA’s Office of Defects Investigation (ODI), the probe volition look astatine the apical velocity that a conveyance tin question portion being remotely controlled, connectivity delays that hap erstwhile a conveyance is summoned, and whether Tesla’s autonomous driving bundle tin sufficiently navigate the environments it is being utilized in.

A little past of Summon, which has had a checkered past for Tesla: A mentation of the diagnostic has been disposable successful Tesla vehicles equipped with the company’s dubiously named “Full Self-Driving Capability” (FSD) since 2016. In theory, the exertion is designed to let a operator to telephone for their conveyance to travel to them, allowing it to autonomously navigate without a idiosyncratic wrong the vehicle. Initially, it lone worked to callback a car from a driveway oregon parking lot.

It yet got upgraded to Smart Summon successful 2019, which enabled the conveyance to navigate much analyzable situations and callback a car from up to 200 feet. After missing galore (many) self-imposed deadlines from Musk, Tesla yet introduced its Actually Smart Summon (abbreviated to sigh ASS) precocious past year. In bid to usage ASS, car owners indispensable property and clasp down a fastener successful the Tesla app portion the car is operating autonomously—an effort to marque the proprietor show the car to marque definite it doesn’t crash. The diagnostic has been panned arsenic slow and inefficient.

Now it’s being investigated for causing accidents. According to the NHTSA, determination is lone 1 authoritative study of an mishap involving a mentation of the Summon software, but determination person been astatine slightest 3 media reports of akin accidents and 12 reports of crashes related to the bundle that person travel successful up Vehicle Owners Questionnaires. Of the 16 full reports connected the NHTSA’s radar, Tesla has shared precisely zero of them with the bureau contempt requirements for crashes involving Automated Driving Systems to beryllium reported.

Musk astir apt isn’t sweating that excessively much—part of his full effort of befriending President-elect Donald Trump has been to lobby for the rollback of mishap study requirements for autonomous vehicles. It seems apt he’ll get his wish, and there’s a non-zero accidental this probe gets closed earlier it adjacent truly gets started.

Even if this probe gets unopen down by the incoming administration, it hasn’t precisely been a banner mates of years for Tesla’s autonomous tech. The NHTSA opened an investigation into the company’s Full Self-Driving strategy past twelvemonth pursuing a bid of high-profile crashes that allegedly progressive the technology. The institution recalled its Autopilot exertion connected much than 2 cardinal cars backmost successful 2023, and the NHTSA is still looking into whether its fixes were really sufficient to code risks associated with the software. The Department of Justice, meanwhile, is inactive successful the process of determining whether Tesla misled consumers and investors with however it has advertised its self-driving features.