US Opens Probe Into Tesla Autopilot After 11 Crashes: Officials

The incidents dating back to 2018 included one fatal crash and seven that resulted in injuries, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

US safety officials opened a preliminary investigation into Tesla's Autopilot after identifying 11 crashes involving the driver assistance system, officials said Monday. The incidents dating back to 2018 included one fatal crash and seven that resulted in injuries, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Tesla founder Elon Musk has defended the Autopilot system and the electric automaker warns that it requires "active driver supervision" behind the wheel, but critics, including in Congress, say the system can be easily fooled and have called for NHTSA to take action. Testers with the magazine Consumer Reports demonstrated in a video that Autopilot could be fooled into driving with nobody behind the wheel, an exercise also shown in widely-seen videos on Tik-Tok and other social media platforms.