Tesla has issued a new over-the-air (OTA) recall in China affecting Model 3 and Model Y vehicles over concerns with how the vehicles monitor driver attention while assisted driving features are in use.
According to China’s State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR), the recall covers 2,740,642 Model 3 and Model Y vehicles manufactured in China. Unlike a separate recall announced at the same time involving emergency mechanical door releases, this recall is focused specifically on Tesla’s driver monitoring system and can be addressed through an OTA software update.
Chinese regulators determined that Tesla’s existing method of monitoring drivers through steering wheel torque is not enough to determine whether they are paying attention to the road.
The concern is that a driver could look away from the road while still applying enough force to the steering wheel to satisfy the system’s attention checks. Regulators say that could increase the risk of a collision when Tesla’s assisted driving system is being used.
Tesla will address the issue entirely through an OTA software update that will add the vehicle’s interior camera to the driver monitoring system, allowing Tesla to detect whether the driver is looking away from the road in addition to monitoring steering wheel input.
This was the second Tesla recall announced in China today. As we reported earlier, the recall concerns emergency mechanical door releases, affecting millions of vehicles from Tesla, Xiaomi, Leapmotor, Xpeng and several other automakers. The fix will make emergency releases easier to identify with the addition of warning labels. Tesla will also deploy an OTA update that automatically lowers the windows after a collision.
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