Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey is putting AV firms on blast for using human staffers

A new investigation from Sen. Ed Markey has zeroed in on the human staffers who operate behind-the-scenes at self-driving car companies like Waymo, Tesla, and Zoox. While many of these companies emphasize that they seek to automate most aspects of driving, they still depend on humans to assist these cars when their software encounters confusing situations—or fails. The investigation began at the beginning of February and was led by Markey, who has taken a particular interest in the self-driving car industry. The study involved sending letters to seven companies working on autonomous vehicles—Aurora, May Mobility, Motional, Nuro, Tesla, Waymo, and Zoox—and asking them detailed questions about when and how they deploy human remote operators or assistants.  None of the seven companies that Markey’s office reached out to were willing to share how often human staffers need to help their autonomous vehicles reorient themselves, Markey’s investigation found. The office’s research also fo