Tesla begins public Cybercab rides in Austin, testing camera-only self-driving bet
Tesla has started offering public rides in its steering-wheel-free Cybercab as part of its Austin robotaxi service, nearly two years after the vehicle was first unveiled. The vehicle relies on a modified version of Tesla's Full Self-Driving software, monitored remotely, rather than the sensor suites—like lidar—used by competitors.
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Because the Cybercab has no manual controls, there is no human driver to intervene if the AI fails, shifting legal and safety responsibility entirely onto Tesla for the first time. Given FSD and Autopilot's history of crashes and fatalities under human supervision, this launch is a real-world stress test of Musk's camera-only autonomy approach against rivals using more robust sensor arrays.
- Tesla has launched public Cybercab rides in Austin as its flagship robotaxi vehicle.
- The vehicle uses camera-only FSD software with remote monitoring instead of a safety driver.
- Tesla now assumes full liability for crashes since passengers have no manual controls to intervene.
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Published there as: “Elon Musk’s heterodox robotaxi philosophy gets put to the test”
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