Taking a page from the playbook of ISP, Tesla Motors will throttle its autopilot feature in an upcoming update to prevent people from ghost riding on highways.
Tesla watchers at Teslarati states that the beta version of firmware update 7.1 adds restrictions to the electric vehicles' autopilot feature.
The new restrictions throttle the speed of the vehicles to below the posted speed limit and might even limit auto steer. But it appears to only affect highway travel.
Autopilot and autosteer were rolled out in an over-the-air update to firmware version 7.0 last October. The software update leveraged the vehicles existing hardware components: forward radar, forward-looking camera, long-range ultrasonic sensors and a digitally-controlled brake assist system.
"We're building Autopilot to give you more confidence behind the wheel, increase your safety on the road, and make highway driving more enjoyable," stated Tesla Motors back in October. The company also compared the autopilot function to what airplane pilots use during unfavorable weather conditions.
Tesla never fails to reiterate that it is the driver who absolutely controls the car. But shortly after autopilot was rolled out, a few people began posting YouTube videos showing them performing stunts while driving with the autosteer engaged. That didn't sit well with Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk.
"This is not good," Musk said. "We'll put on some constraints on autopilot to minimize people doing crazy things with it."
And now, the alleged throttling of autopilot isn't sitting well with some motorists.
In a Tesla forum, user kirkbdavis said that he chose Tesla without the restrictions stated in the Teslarati article. "I would certainly seek remedy ... if the functionally of the car I purchased was changed significantly for the worse. On the good side - I am enjoying the car and look forward to using it as delivered," he added.
