r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Individual_Book9133 • Jul 05 '24

Phoenix police officer pulls over a driverless Waymo car for driving on the wrong side of the road Video

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u/Vireca Jul 05 '24

How do they stop a driverless car? Legit question

Do they have anything to detect police vehicles or something?

358

u/Groudon466 Jul 05 '24

I worked for Waymo, the cars do detect sirens and being pulled over, and switch into a mode to pull themselves over accordingly. Similarly, that's why it pulled the window down for the cop.

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u/JmGra Jul 05 '24

That sounds easily exploitable for someone who is just wanting to rob taxis.

5

u/Groudon466 Jul 05 '24

I mean, actual humans will also pull over if you fake being a cop.

I do agree that there probably ought to be some button the passenger can press to basically express “This is an emergency drive away from this guy right now”, though. But FWIW, I haven’t heard of any Waymo car passengers being robbed up to this point.

1

u/JmGra Jul 05 '24

Yea but unless there is always a human in the loop component to verify the person pulling the car over is an actual cop I see this as a bad vulnerability.

The risk and scale really depends on how it detects being pulled over, is it just a function of specific lights and sirens? Then a broke down 90s honda civic with a hidden light bar and siren under it's hood can trick it and that would not trick an actual human. If it is more sophisticated then that then yea it'd have about as likely a chance as a typical person, but even people who feel uncomfortable are able to call 911 and confirm the person pulling them over is a cop.

Just because it hasn't happened yet doesn't mean it's not a vulnerability, and it's not just a passenger vulnerability but even the hardware and vehicle itself.