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Tesla said it didn’t have key data in a fatal crash. Then a hacker found it.

⁨535⁩ ⁨likes⁩

Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨mesamunefire@piefed.social⁩ to ⁨technology@lemmy.world⁩

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2025/08/29/tesla-autopilot-crashes-evidence-testimony-wrongful-death/

https://archive.ph/s1psp

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Comments

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  • Yawweee877h444@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    So they lied. And they’ll lie again. And they’ll get away with it.

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    • mesamunefire@piefed.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      Well they have to pay 200+ million. So im not sure if "get away" is the right word

      "It took the jury less than a day of deliberation to find Tesla 33 percent liable for the crash and responsible for $243 million in punitive and compensatory damages."

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      • Whitebrow@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        Almost 100 billion revenue last year.

        250 million of 100 billion is what… 0.25%?

        Yeah. That’s nothing to them.

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        • -> View More Comments
  • b3an@lemmy.world ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Good article! Thanks for the archive link. Amazing that this type of shady shit which Tesla is doing is likewise behind a paywalled source where people can’t get this information as easily.

    Inside a Starbucks near the Miami airport, the plaintiffs’ attorneys watched as greentheonly fired up his ThinkPad computer and plugged in a flash drive containing a forensic copy of the Autopilot unit’s contents. Within minutes, he found key data that was marked for deletion — along with confirmation that Tesla had received the collision snapshot within moments of the crash — proving the critical information should have actually been accessible all along. The attorneys high-fived behind him.

    Basically too, Tesla has also tried to delete the data again by powering up the unit from the crash, which would have ‘updated’ the device and conveniently removed data. How STRANGE it maintains this behavior… especially for collision snapshots.

    Tesla is actively harming people, lying about it, and using shitty tactics to avoid any responsibility for it. Just like its daddy, Elon.

    Seriously. This is so fucked yo. I’m NEVER EVER going to buy Tesla.

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  • dinckelman@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    Tesla? The same company, that was revealed to delete sensitive data out of the crashed vehicles, after it was remotely downloaded, and pretend it was “mysteriously” unavailable?

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  • logicbomb@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    The information was key for a wrongful death case the survivor and the victim’s family were building against Tesla, but the company said it didn’t have the data.

    Then a self-described hacker, enlisted by the plaintiffs to decode the contents of a chip they recovered from the vehicle, found it while sipping a Venti-size hot chocolate at a South Florida Starbucks. Tesla later said in court that it had the data on its own servers all along.

    Joel Smith, Tesla’s attorney, said in an interview that the company was “clumsy” in its handling of the data but did not engage in any impropriety with regard to it. “It is the most ridiculous perfect storm you’ve ever heard,” Smith said, in an effort to explain why Tesla was unable to produce the collision snapshot data until after the hacker retrieved it for the plaintiffs.

    In court, Smith told jurors in his opening statement that Tesla would “never think about hiding” the data because it proved that the driver had time to react to the pedestrians standing by their parked car had he been paying attention.

    “We didn’t think we had it, and we found out we did,” he said. “And, thankfully, we did because this is an amazingly helpful piece of information.”

    For reference, here is a poem called the Narcissist’s Prayer:

    That didn’t happen.
    And if it did, it wasn’t that bad.
    And if it was, that’s not a big deal.
    And if it is, that’s not my fault.
    And if it was, I didn’t mean it.
    And if I did, you deserved it.

    If I was on the jury or I was the judge in a non-jury trial and this happened, I would have pushed for the largest decision possible. No company or person should be allowed to act like this.

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    • rainwall@piefed.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      The jury basically didexactly that. They weren't buying they "oopsy doopsy" story.

      They found Tesla liable for $235 million. It's the first case Tesla hasent been able to settle, and that's a big ol' number. They are going to have more lawsuits coming.

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    • A_norny_mousse@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      Tesla’s attorney, said in an interview that the company was “clumsy” in its handling of the data but did not engage in any impropriety with regard to it.

      You know what really ticks me off? Every driving Joe and Jane learns that negligence or ignorance or “clumsiness” does not excuse you from breaking the rules.

      A very basic tenet of lawfulness. Which does not seem to apply to multi-billion-money-corpos.

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      • paraphrand@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        And it’s strange, because corporations are sposto be people now right?

        What a fucking joke.

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  • LoafedBurrito@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    Clear fraud and an attempt to undermine the American public.

    Tesla and SpaceX are some of the largest welfare receivers in the country. But they refuse to take accountability or clean up their messes.

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  • MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    How does archive get the unpaywalled version? I don’t think they pay the subscription for every single tabloid out there?

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    • stoly@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      The paywall is JavaScript but the content is still in plaintext below. The crawlers don’t read the JavaScript.

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      • MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        Disabling 3rd-party js has no paywall, but only the first paragraph too. Crawlers get full access?

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    • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      I think they use the same thing that web crawlers use. If Google’s crawler couldn’t access the content of the page (or could only access a limited amount of content), it would likely rank far lower in search results

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      • MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        Btw, why is there no search engine where you can sort and filter how you want instead of how they want?

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  • lobut@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    I’m sure whoever is in charge into the government, who will have no interests in this, is going to definitely look into Tesla.

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  • redditexcommunicado@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    Nothing too surprising here

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