Driverless cars promise to be a game-changing mode of transportation. They’re already out and about in some cities, serving taxi duty, with varying levels of success. Unfortunately, though, these are also naive, vulnerable machines that are easily taken advantage of by bad actors. We’re seeing this play out all too regularly right now.
I spoke to Amina this week on this very topic. She’s a San Francisco local, and she’s used Waymo to get around the city on multiple occasions without fuss. However, just a few days ago, she says her ride went very differently.
During her journey, Amina’s Waymo came to a halt at a red light. As shown in her 58 second video posted to X formerly known as Twitter, a man can be seen approaching and blocking the way; the video then shows him asking for her phone number. The driverless car stopped firm, unwilling to drive with humans in the roadway ahead. Amina was stuck with nowhere to go.
????Warning to women in SF ????
I love Waymo but this was scary ????
2 men stopped in front of my car and demanded that I give my number.
It left me stuck as the car was stalled in the street.
Thankfully, it only lasted a few minutes…
Ladies please be aware of this pic.twitter.com/6VEqb1WoJb
— Amina (@Amina_io) September 30, 2024
“The car was stopped at a red light and the first man came over and stood in front of the car,” she says. “This caused the car to stop and refuse to move with a message on its screen that said something along the lines of ‘We will help you shortly.'” This was, by and large, the expected behavior for an autonomous vehicle—to stop when a person stands in front of it. The problem is that it left Amina in a difficult situation.
The man can be seen stepping away for a second, then returning with company. “The men came over to the car again and stood in front of it for a few minutes,” she says. In her video, one can be seen waving repeatedly with a “call me” gesture, as she yells repeatedly—”Go! GET OUT!” After some time, the two men can be seen finally leaving the roadway, one tipping his hat for some unfathomable reason.
Due to the unexpected situation, the Waymo had stopped for safety reasons. “Finally when they left, the car was still stalled,” says Amina. Thankfully, she was promptly able to get help with the issue. “I clicked the ‘in car support’ on the screen and they seemed to be aware of the issue,” she explains. “They asked if I was OK, and the car began to drive towards my location.” The Waymo operator asked if she needed police support, which she declined.
She says Waymo staff followed up with her after the event, too. “When I nearly arrived at the location, the in-car support called me again to make sure I was okay,” she says. “I assured him that I was fine and he told me I would be given a free ride after.” Hours later, she got a follow-up call, too. “They asked if I was OK and told me that they have 24/7 support available,” she says.
Amina was stuck in an uncomfortable situation in a car that refused to move. Exiting the vehicle would be a particularly unattractive option in this case, too. This is a difficult case for an autonomous system to deal with. It can’t reasonably move forward without risking injury to pedestrians, nor can it conceivably understand when pedestrians are being massive jerks.
It’s an interesting thought exercise to contrast this with a human driver. While some might be tempted to simply drive forward, that’s a course of action that could lead to legal difficulties. The courts often look poorly on drivers who intentionally run people over. However, the human mind is far more adaptable than an autonomous driving system. One could have potentially reversed, switched lanes, or veered around the men when they weren’t directly in front of the vehicle. Or just laid on the horn like crazy.
It’s a simple human desire to have some level of control in situations like these. An autonomous vehicle offers none.
It’s apparent that people are well aware of how easy it is to mess with these vehicles. Last week, we saw an eerily similar situation where a group of vandals surrounded a Waymo car to graffiti the vehicle. Once more, the vehicle dutifully held position while it was defaced by the group.
Here’s what Waymo told us at the time:
Though these events are exceedingly rare over the hundreds of thousands of trips we provide each month, we take them very seriously and work with law enforcement if they occur. The trust and safety of the community is our top priority, both for people who choose to ride with us and with whom we share the streets.
The Autopian has reached out to Waymo for comment on this most recent matter.
While these incidents are concerning, they haven’t entirely dulled Amina’s enthusiasm for the technology. “I was in a pretty severe car accident as a child and have anxieties around driving due to it, [so] I’ve been looking forward to this type of technology for a long time,” she says. “With that said, I think the human factor in this issue is going to be a lot harder to solve than anything else.” Her belief is that this technology will be safer with widespread adoption.
Amina thinks that with the right measures, Waymo could be safer than it currently is. “Personal safety measures I can take include sitting in the driver’s seat to give the illusion of control or sitting in the backseat where the windows are tinted,” she says. Notably, though, Waymo does not actually allow riders to sit in the driver’s position. “On Waymo’s side of things, they can encourage the cars to avoid driving in the Tenderloin or certain areas of SOMA… certain areas have a higher amount of people running in the streets which would probably increase incidents like this happening.”
Few of us would enjoy being stuck in a vehicle that could potentially be easily trapped by cruel interlopers with bad intentions. Giving up control to an autonomous system is not ideal when it comes with drawbacks like these. For now, though, there isn’t a good answer on how autonomous cars should deal with these situations.
Image credits: Waymo, Amina_io via Twitter screenshot
Yet another justification for a trunk monkey.
Nobody is giving their phone number to a porkpie hat wearing dingus
The car isn’t human; it can’t be “encouraged.” It can be permitted to drive within the Tenderloin, or not, but the car presumably doesn’t have agency in the matter.
Moreover, while I’m less familiar with San Francisco’s conveyance regulatory regimes, in LA (among others), taxi medallions as well as granted franchises (IE, operational permission to pick up fares in the area) mandated that the franchise pick up all fares that phone in in order to reduce disparate impact. In other words, if you had the franchise for North Hollywood, you couldn’t redline parts of North Hollywood you wouldn’t pick up in. I don’t know what Waymo’s license grants them, but it’s something worth noting.
If there are specific areas a fare wishes to avoid, then offer individual passengers an option to select an area they don’t wish to travel through and route around ir. And charge them accordingly.
As far as actually handling this in the car, the car can’t read emotions. It doesn’t know if the individual in front of it is a police officer telling the car not to drive over the highly dangerous gasoline spill ahead or a malicious actor. Trying to program logic – like “If held for more than one minute, navigate around and proceed forward” will result in the car driving past a flagger and getting into a head-on collision with a piece of heavy equipment.
Really, Waymo support just needs a rapid response. Somebody hits a button in the car, somebody in the ops center can look at the cameras and make a judgment (hold, navigate and exit forward, navigate and exit rearward). This is something AI is exquisitely poorly equipped to address.
Like an OnStar button to call for help.
“Prioritize occupant”
MethSalts are a hell of a drug.Look at the teeth on these tweaked out goombas. And everyone wonders why downtowns are struggling economically.
Yeah, I have. Hipsters have certainly taken a turn for the worse lately, eh?
Waymo than she bargained for.
Waymo is using the wrong Jaguar. They need to replace their fleet with these Jags (https://images-stag.jazelc.com/uploads/theautopian-m2en/Die_ANother_Day-2-e1726000076380.jpeg) and install non life threatening arms. Cattle prod, rubber bullets, bean bags, bear spray, put a sound cannon where the turret is, and no-one would stand in front.
First laugh of the day – “non life-threateningn arms” made me picture a pair of oversized, human(ish) arms unfolding from the grill to slap those two creeps into last week.
Nah, too complicated. Let’s just make the fenders mounted on robotic arms that can be used to smash these fools like a monkey with his cymbals
I agree with all of these solutions. IIRC I suggested similar ones last week.
These degenerate scumbags demonstrate how easy it is to trip these things up and I nod at how easily it could be much worse for a passenger.
It does seem like there should be a limit to how long someone can stand in front of a car without moving before the car overrides its original programming.
You stand there for 2 straight minutes, you’re doing something bad, and the car should give audible warnings and start inching forward.
Unless there’s a medical emergency in front of it. Can it tell the difference? Could it just sensibly go around if it’s safe to do so? I think the world is just too complex for these machines and certainly the very limited capabilities of their programmers.
This would be preferred of course, but the fact that it didn’t do so here makes me wonder if it isn’t capable.
They definitely need some enhanced problem solving recognition and reaction. This was just some delusional dumb creep and we’ve seen vandals, so when’s the robbery and other assaults, maybe murder? It seems people who are entirely unfamiliar with humans have developed these. Maybe they saw the first part of the “utopian” future in Demolition Man, but didn’t finish the movie.
Seems like an easy SF car jacking. Cover face, 1 person stands in front of car, other smashes window and demands wallet or purse.
I thought car jacking was having your car stolen when you’re driving it?
Although whatever rime you just described it does sound although to easy.
Didn’t work out well for the woman run over by the GM robotaxi. Why would it work here?
I think that’s exactly the Waymo-Cruise difference at work here, a GM Cruise vehicle would’ve run them over.
Touche doushy
Can’t Waymo write an exception into the code that you stop for pedestrians unless they’re wearing a fedora?
Sometimes they’re dangerous, but often they’re just insufferable. Either way, drive over them.
I would suggest an “EMO” button, or better said, a “PANIC” button. Press it, and the police are called and the horn sounds. This could for sure be abused, but it’s a better option than nothing. This story is a bit terrifying. I’m sorry people did this to you.
I mean sure it could be abused, but ban people or institute fines for people who misuse it. If it’s calling the cops, it would automatically carry the same impact as making a false 911 call.
It needs one of those inflatable “autopilots” from the Airplane movie in the drivers seat. Problem solved!
The car didn’t have any clearance to move. It’s vector was unavailable.
To use some old-country words, the ride was rogered.
Edit coz I donut how to spel.
Roger, Roger.
Somehow the guy looks exactly like you’d expect him too. Like Reddit personified.
“Check it out, I found something even more of a sure bet than hitting on your bartender!”
We don’t have these in my area. Does Waymo have outside cameras on the vehicles that record activity for when this kind of thing happens?
No, there are no cameras or other sensing devices on the robot taxi.
Thank you. Seems like there should be.
867-5309
Sorry, I lost that number.
I am wondering if there are so many “younguns” around, that they do not get that reference.
was this the number for Jesse’s Girl, the one Ricky was supposed to send in a letter to himself so he wouldn’t forget when he lost it?
Close. It was Billy who wasn’t supposed to forget the number.
I thought Billy wasn’t supposed to be a hero? Wrong song?
You’re thinking of Jack, and his girlfriend Diane.
Didn’t they have a run-in with the lawman in Texas who always knows the facts?
Is he the one that didn’t shoot the deputy?
I think that was Brenda. Or Eddie.
Eddie? Isn’t that the ship that sank in Lake Superior?
The wreck of the Eddie Fitz, I’m dying lol
I thought Lake Superior jumped the gun.
What about Ricky?
Was it Ricky who said it was never a good time to say goodbye to Sarah?
Ricky was admonished to not lose that number as its the only one she owns.
I distinctly remember waving goodbye to those two.
That’s a what, 1980 song? Kinda far out dude. But they’re people too! (The younguns I mean)
634-5789
Bear spray. …or fart spray.
or bear fart spray!
Oh you want my phone number? Sure! its 555-1212. Alternatively 1-800-Fuc Koff, 888-Eat-Shit, etc.
Also good (if they still exist) are those scam psychic/porn numbers that charge you like $2000/second. Is Mrs Cleo still around? I’m sure she’d love to talk to this guy.
But best of all the number of SFPD.
Or say fine I’ll call you, get his name, address and number and put it on the dark web.
,
My number? It’s 911, and I’m dialing it for you right now.
A driver of a taxi provides two services – a driver takes a passenger from point A to point B and a driver also provides a minimal level of security for the passenger. Robotaxi providers have forgotten the importance of this second service.
Robot taxis have door locks and better real time event recording facilities. They can also call for help faster and provide footage to the prosecution later.
I’m sure the victim of an assault will be thankful for the video evidence.
Ability to provide evidence for prosecution of wrongdoing is no substitute for the ability to remove oneself so that the wrongdoing doesn’t happen.
AFAIK the options for a passenger in a human driven taxi and an autonomous one are exactly the same – lock the doors or get out and run. A passenger has no control over the vehicle in either case.
If anything a passenger is safer in an AV since robots don’t assault passengers.
You forgot option 3, telling the driver to drive away from the crims.
A human driver can say no if its company policy. That’s effectively the case with the AV here.
Because remember kids, prosecution is far better than prevention! Did you lick the guy who has Covid? Forget isolation, just sue him! Don’t use condoms, just sick the DCFS on his useless ass after you get pregnant and have the kid! Just remember to video it.
So how exactly is a passenger in a human driven taxi better off?
If I were a human driven taxi passenger I’d worry more about being assaulted by the driver than by random passers by.
You seriously don’t think there are things a human could have done in this situation? Back up? Drive in the wrong lane to go around? Lay on the horn? Computers CANNOT assess a situation like this as well as a human can, and they might not ever be able to.
Sure, and potentially get charged with vehicular assault in the process.
Computers CANNOT assess a situation like this as well as a human can, and they might not ever be able to.
I disagree. That AV could easily have been programmed to do any of those things but thanks to public outcry its been told to NOT do those things.
AS to what a computer vs human can and can’t do lets look at what happened when a pedestrian was struck by both an AV and a human driven car:
The AV detected the impact and immediately pulled over, dragging the pedestrian 20 feet or maybe two car lengths. The pedestrian was not visible to either the cameras nor to a potential human driver so there is no reason a human driver would have done any differently. The AV did the responsible thing given the situation.
Public reaction? OUTRAGE!! SEE HOW UNSAFE AVs ARE?!?!?!? BAN THEM!!!!
The human driver who hit that pedestrian in the first place? Fled the scene and is still at large.
Public reaction? Absolutely nothing.
So tell me again how much better human drivers are.
OK, bro.
A human driver could have backed up and gone around these two d-bags. And could have hit the horn to both draw attention and make it unpleasant for them to stand near the car.
And how do you know there wasn’t traffic backed up preventing that from happening? It’s downtown SF so its likely that was the case.
A person is a deterrent just by their presence. Assault is far less likely if there is a physical witness.
This happened in downtown SF in broad daylight with plenty of other people around. Clearly having other people around were not a deterrent.
Yeah, but how do they do testifying in a real court room?
BTW, am waiting for Law and Order to co-opt this story for a future episode.
If you mean the AVs they simply provide the video footage just as a cell phone or video camera would. They can also provide impact information if the car is attacked or someone tries to break in.
Aside from maybe being harder to stop and hold than the AV in a case like this about all a meat based driver would do better would be to discourage the behavior by simply being present. More rent-a-cop and less Kevin Costner. Would be interesting (read: probably grim as frig…) to compare stats of harassment kinda unique to AVs like this vs that perpetrated by a human driver. In the absence of that data I’d be inclined to take my chances with the AV.
Futures made of virtual insanity, now
Always seem to be governed by this love we have
For useless twisting of our new technology
Oh, now there is no sound
For we all live underground, whoa
I imagine this is what methed-out Jay Kay was saying to the occupant.
Flame throwers are the answer to hipsters.
Hipsters who look like they never saw a toothbrush. Those anti carjacking flamethrowers are the best thing to come out of South Africa (that’s quite likely not true, but they are awesome).
The car needs a warning like “Deploying Anti Personnel Counter Measures” – then have the flame throwers come out.
I predict Waymo of these incidents.
Sigh. Take your smiley face.
Just pull a John Carlyle and get the droids to take care of them.
Hat tip, but no “m’lady”?
Mental illness
Nah, that removes responsibility from those chumps – more likely just pure, insufferable douchebaggery.
Some people should have been bullied harder.
Maybe a 120db train horn would’ve made Mr. Drunk Hat Guy get out of the way.
A bumper mounted cattle prod would be much more effective. Or maybe a bumper mounted chainsaw.
Cow-catcher.
Cow destroyer.
Claymore mine, made non-lethal with rock salt.
Roof mounted turret with a semiauto beanbag gun.
Problem SOLVED.
I pray such turrets are not autonomous, but instead the waymo people get an alert and take over the turret when it needs to be shot. I pray this because I WANT THAT JOB.
Why not just have the turret controls for the passenger? Could increase ridership quite a bit to make the ride a bit more entertaining
well because I want the job. I dont want to ride in driverless taxis.
I was wondering whether the Waymo support person has the ability to sound the horn. But my guess is that even if they do, they’re not going to do it because autonomous vehicles have plenty of opposition without adding more due to their car horns.