Technology @lemmy.world Lee Duna @lemmy.nz 7mo ago

Tesla Tech Allowed An Abusive Husband To Break A Restraining Order, And A San Francisco Judge Sided With The Automaker

jalopnik.com Tesla Tech Allowed An Abusive Husband To Break A Restraining Order, And A San Francisco Judge Sided With The Automaker

The man used the Tesla app to track his estranged wife and leave a threatening message behind

13 comments

I mean, if Tesla thinks the guy is the owner, then he should be able to know where it is and control it. If he was no longer the owner, they should have updated that with Tesla.
- Yeah sounds like a simple case
  
  Yeah, but look at the source.
  
  Same article could say women tried to block co-owner from vehicle.
  
  Over two years of she was in such fear of husband why didn't she buy out/sell the car she has co-owned title on.
- It's not about who is the owner. They both were. It's about the fact that Tesla only supports having 1 owner, and the husband set himself up as the owner and added the wife as an additional driver.
  
  Honestly, I don't see a good way out of this without adding a feature that only the profile that unlocked the car last being able to see where it is. That's not a feature they have, nor are legally required to provide.
- Usually in cases like this the court looks to who makes the payments. He may be co owner but if he hasn't made any payments since separating and hasn't used the vehicle it isn't his.
According to a lawsuit filed by the abused, the man was listed as the primary owner of the 2016 Tesla Model X they shared

He's allowed to track his own car lol
- To be fair, if he knowingly used the feature at all he also knows he breached the restraining order.
  
  The correct outcome here was he declares it to the court and the car becomes single owner.
The honor system nature of restraining orders allowed the abusive husband to break the restraining order. They just make it extra illegal when the restrained person goes ahead and commits whatever crime they were going to commit anyway.
Wait a minute. The cars can barely drive, and now you want them to enforce the law???

That is the most insane shit I've ever heard.
Sounds like the restraining order should have listed out additional remedies, or maybe even made her the sole owner.
Tesla told the woman that it could not remove her husband’s access to the car’s technology because his name remained on the vehicle’s title as a co-owner, along with hers, according to records she filed in her lawsuit.

This sounds like a problem courts needed to resolve, not Tesla. They don't reasonably know which spouse has legal possession of the car.

13 comments