Tesla's vehicles use cameras a lot. Only a couple of days ago, the world's highest capitalised automaker said that it will be using its onboard cameras more leveraging computer vision to launch a step up in its self-driving tech called Tesla Vision. Tesla Vision is being touted as a next-generation AutoPilot feature. AutoPilot, however, has been polarising as many people have bypassed the safeguards Tesla has put in place and used it in an unsafe way with no driver monitoring and intervention in place. To circumvent this issue, Tesla has now started to use the in-car rearview mirror camera to monitor the driver to ensure proper use of AutoPilot.
Tesla has started to use the cameras in the Model 3 and Model Y to make sure people are paying attention to the road while AutoPilot is engaged. Before this update, Tesla used to monitor the drivers using the torque sensors on the steering wheel as the driver always needs to have their hands on the wheel to have AutoPilot engaged.
Tesla will use in-car cameras to monitor driver attentiveness when AutoPilot is engaged
This change has come after years of scrutiny and criticism from regulators and safety experts for better driver monitoring. Even Elon Musk, who is a big proponent of AutoPilot has admitted most of the accidents have happened because of complacency from the users. But Musk has also been cagey about adding a more sophisticated driver monitoring system in the past. Looks like he has finally given in.
Tesla isn't the first one to monitor the driver using the in-car camera using eye-tracking based systems. Ford and General Motors are already doing this even though their driver assistance systems aren't nearly as sophisticated and autonomous as Teslas.
undefinedDelivery was super smooth. Summon and lane departure avoidance disabled for now, increased follow distance, hard cap at 75, requires auto brights or kicks out of AP, cabin camera for driver monitoring.. nothing unexpected yet. pic.twitter.com/gKIkHSGNI7
— Kevin Smith (@spleck) May 27, 2021
A Twitter user spotted by the 'Verge' noticed the new feature was enabled by a software update. "The cabin camera above your rearview mirror can now detect and alert driver inattentiveness while Autopilot is engaged. Camera data does not leave the car itself, which means the system cannot save or transmit information unless data sharing is enabled," said the user also indicating that the steering wheel sensors were also active.
The new Model S and Model X cars haven't started shipping yet, so chances are the changes have also been made to them. However, one must note that the in-car camera was first introduced last year in the Model 3 and Model Y and Tesla started using the feature when people started testing its full self-driving beta version of AutoPilot which is what Tesla is now calling Tesla Vision. During the beta tests, Musk revealed that some users didn't pay attention and that's why they were removed from the programme.
