Tesla CEO Elon Musk is confident in their self-driving cars and believes they could be a competition for the current transportation systems of Uber and Lyft. Musk noted that owners will be able to earn money through the features available in their vehicles. Here's what we know about Musk's announcement.
According to Musk's official Twitter, the CEO explained the vehicle's potential to a Tesla owner, particularly the vehicle's rearview mirror camera. Musk said that the camera is for when the Tesla vehicles are "working" for their owners as they "self-drive" passengers to destinations. This "self-driving taxi" system is confirmed through an autonomous Tesla driving system, which could be a large network used for managing the self-driving cars.
While Tesla would be handling their own network, another Musk tweet confirmed that Tesla owners can have their own network of self-driving vehicles similar to that of a taxi handler.
Tesla may truly be aiming to join the competition of ride hailing apps and face off against Uber, Lyft and Grab. Depending on how well Tesla handles this "self-driving Tesla taxi fleet," these apps may entirely be replaced with Tesla's cars.
While Musk says that owners have their security assured through the vehicle's rearview mirror camera, Tesla hasn't been putting up a strong show of their security features. Previously, some security specialists confirmed that anybody with hacking knowledge can breach a Tesla car's data storage if they get their hands on it, such as by taking it from a crashed Tesla car.
Moreover, the Pwn2own competition also had security specialists succeed in hacking a Tesla Model 3 sedan's systems. Unless the Tesla's car security is improved, going for a "self-driving car taxi fleet" might be big risk for users to invest in.
As of now, Tesla is about to release some variants of the Model Y crossover SUV later this year and its standard battery variant in early 2020. Since Tesla is slowly easing into affordable vehicles starting with the Model Y, Tesla could be a viable brand for easily populating taxi fleets with vehicles.
This article was first published in IBTimes US. Permission required for reproduction.
