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One In Five Drivers Switches Off The Safety Tech Meant To Save Their Lives (www.carscoops.com)
submitted 1 week ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 33 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I've disabled safety tech in cars I drive because the signal to noise ratio was bad.

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  • [–] 19 points 1 week ago (1 child)

    You're going over the speed limit, says the shitty sign recognition that missed the one outside that says otherwise.

    You're tired, says the racist eye closure camera that can't deal with Asian eyes.

    Your seatbelt is undone, says the sensor that can't discern between your backpack and a person. (To be fair, this one is just for the power of threes. Buckle in heavy objects. Secure your load.)

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  • [–] 1 point 1 week ago

    My seat sensor is capacitive so if I have something sufficiently wet (like chinese takeout) or my phone plugged into the charger with the cord slack on the seat it thinks there is a person and beeps incessantly.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 week ago (2 children)

    My 2015 would have the 'collision alert' because a car was in an adjacent turn lane, but the road curved and it didn't know that.

    It also would go off most days on a stretch of road because it was certain I was going to slam into the guardrail of the curve. Again, the system had no cameras, no map awareness, so it just had radar saying 'something metal ahead'.

    It was slightly annoying but left it on, just in case.

    Now my 2023 on the other hand hasn't had a false positive that I can recall, in fact if not for one incident, I wouldn't even know it was doing anything. Someone pulled right out in front of my kid learning to drive. I had just enough time to think "oh, we are going to hit or my kid is going to yank this thing off the road". Instead, my kid executed a shockingly perfect evasive swerve that landed perfectly into the free lane. Then I find out that it also would take over steering and as a result, I'm pretty certain it saved me a pretty significant wreck.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 week ago (1 child)

    Then I find out that it also would take over steering

    Um. This is kind of terrifying.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 week ago

    Based on what I saw and what I read, it only took over of it detected you trying to swerve and an obstacle that would hit and change it into an aggressive lane change. The steering into was at least roughly the maneuver desired, but it just corrected it.

    Though it may sound scary, it absolutely worked in my scenario. I've never ever seen it activate accidentally.

    I can't even be sure whether it activated or not that time, I wasn't driving. It just seemed like a scenario and maneuver unlikely for a barely driving 15 year old to pull off so perfectly. I'm not so sure even I would have avoided an accident, but even if I did, I doubt I would have hit the maneuver so spot on.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 week ago

    Two hours ago, I was driving in my little town. Speed limit is about 35. At the edge of town is one of those giant freeway-style lighted signboards that flashes some info about upcoming construction starting soon. When you see them on the freeway, they don't look as big. When you're up close to one, you realize they're pretty freaking big.

    Anyway, the signboard is now on it's back, all fucked up, twisted and broken. Looks like a dinosaur picked it up, bit it and threw it. A little farther up the road is a late model kia sedan with the front torn off and some fucking twat of a driver taking pictures of his car.

    So I don't know what model he was in, but it was one of the larger sedans, so not an Elantra or something cheap. I know darn well that it at least had to have automatic emergency braking, maybe even some other driver aids. Somehow, this muppet was able to NOT see the giant lit up, bright orange signboard and his car did nothing to stop anything by the looks of it.

    So it doesn't surprise me that people turn this shit off, not one tiny bit. It's always the people who need to have them on the most, as usual.

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