{"id":61589,"date":"2026-02-06T09:27:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-06T02:27:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/waymos-self-driving-claims-called-into-question-on-capitol-hill\/"},"modified":"2026-02-06T09:27:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-06T02:27:12","slug":"waymos-self-driving-claims-called-into-question-on-capitol-hill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/waymos-self-driving-claims-called-into-question-on-capitol-hill\/","title":{"rendered":"Waymo\u2019s \u2018Self-Driving\u2019 Claims Called into Question on Capitol Hill"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<div>\n<h4 color=\"#333\">In brief<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Waymo told senators that human operators overseas provide guidance to its vehicles in difficult situations but do not control driving.<\/li>\n<li>Sen. Ed Markey said overseas involvement raises safety, cybersecurity, and accountability concerns.<\/li>\n<li>Waymo defended the practice as limited contextual assistance as Congress weighs new federal AV rules.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<p>Waymo\u2019s claim that its vehicles operate without human drivers drew sharp scrutiny on Wednesday after a senior executive acknowledged that overseas operators help guide the company\u2019s autonomous cars through difficult situations on U.S. streets, raising new questions about what \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/decrypt.co\/353909\/elon-musk-nvidias-self-driving-tech-still-years-challenging-tesla\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">self-driving<\/a>\u201d really means.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=ZcsVJtcUyp8&#038;t=3870s\" target=\"_blank\">Testifying<\/a> before the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, <a href=\"https:\/\/decrypt.co\/324336\/robotic-waymo-cars-torched-ice-protest-los-angeles\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Waymo<\/a> Chief Safety Officer Mauricio Pe\u00f1a confirmed that the company relies on remote human operators to assist vehicles when they encounter scenarios they cannot independently resolve.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey provide guidance, they do not remotely drive the vehicles,\u201d Pe\u00f1a told lawmakers. \u201cWaymo asks for guidance in certain situations and gets an input, but the Waymo vehicle is always in charge of the dynamic driving task.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The answer did not satisfy Senator Edward Markey (D., Mass.), who asked whether all of the remote operators were based in the U.S. Pe\u00f1a said they were not, later identifying the overseas location as the Philippines.<\/p>\n<p>Markey warned that overseas human involvement undermines public claims of full autonomy while introducing safety and cybersecurity risks.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHaving people overseas influencing American vehicles is a safety issue,\u201d Markey said. \u201cThe information the operators receive could be outdated. It could introduce tremendous cybersecurity vulnerabilities.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Lawmakers also questioned whether remote operators abroad are subject to U.S. licensing or regulatory standards, and criticized Waymo for outsourcing what he described as one of the few remaining human jobs in an increasingly automated system.<\/p>\n<h2 color=\"#333\">National framework<\/h2>\n<p>The Senate hearing comes as Congress weighs whether to include a national autonomous-vehicle framework in the next surface transportation reauthorization bill, and as Waymo faces additional scrutiny following its attempts to scale its business into new markets.<\/p>\n<p>On Monday, the robo taxi company announced a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnbc.com\/2026\/02\/02\/waymo-announced-16-billion-fundraising-round.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">$16 billion<\/a> funding round, bringing the valuation of the company to $126 billion.<\/p>\n<p>In an interview with <i>Decrypt<\/i>, a Waymo spokesperson clarified that the company does not consider its remote operators to be drivers and rejected the idea that humans are controlling vehicles in real time.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTheir role is not to drive the vehicle remotely. They\u2019re not remote drivers,\u201d the spokesperson said. \u201cThey answer, generally speaking, multiple-choice questions posed to them by the vehicle.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAll of the driving actually happens on board of that vehicle. It doesn\u2019t happen remotely,\u201d they added.<\/p>\n<p>The spokesperson said both U.S.-based and overseas fleet response agents are licensed drivers and receive training on local road rules in the regions they support.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAll fleet response agents, both those based in the U.S. and those based abroad, have vehicle or van driver\u2019s licenses,\u201d the spokesperson said. \u201cThey learn about local road rules where they will be providing remote assistance.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Waymo characterized the human input as contextual rather than directive.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe human offers a suggestion in a challenging scenario, and the <a href=\"https:\/\/waymo.com\/waymo-driver\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow external\">Waymo Driver<\/a> will take that suggestion into account when making its next decision,\u201d the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n<p>Some safety researchers said remote human involvement can still play a decisive role when things go wrong.<\/p>\n<p>Philip Koopman, a professor emeritus at Carnegie Mellon University who studies autonomous-vehicle safety, pointed to past crashes in which remote assistance contributed to errors.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEven though Waymo says these remote assistants aren\u2019t actually steering or braking, their helping out can substantially contribute to a crash, and, in my mind, that makes them a backup driver,\u201d Koopman told <i>Decrypt.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>William Riggs, a professor at the University of San Francisco who studies autonomous-vehicle policy and deployment, said the use of off-site human support is consistent with how autonomous systems are designed and regulated today.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is also important to distinguish between &#8216;remote human assistance&#8217; and &#8216;remote driving,&#8217; as these terms are often conflated,\u201d Riggs told <i>Decrypt.<\/i> \u201cRemote driving involves directly controlling a vehicle from a distance, whereas remote supervision\u2014used by companies developing true Level 4 autonomy\u2014enables vehicles to make on-board decisions independently, with remote supervisors acting as a support layer rather than direct operators.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe vehicles still operate within their agreed-upon and permitted Operational Design Domains (ODDs),\u201d he added. \u201cThese ODDs are carefully defined in collaboration with state regulators and adhere to evolving legal frameworks around driving rules.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The hearing comes as U.S. states continue to issue <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dmv.ca.gov\/portal\/vehicle-industry-services\/autonomous-vehicles\/california-autonomous-vehicle-regulations\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">regulations<\/a> governing autonomous vehicles and as Congress weighs whether to pass a federal law overseeing the technology. Waymo and other companies, including Tesla, which also testified during the hearing, face heightened scrutiny over their self-driving capabilities.<\/p>\n<p><i>Editor&#8217;s note: This headline has been adjusted to more fairly reflect Waymo&#8217;s testimony to the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.<\/i><\/p>\n<div>\n<h3>Daily Debrief Newsletter<\/h3>\n<p>Start every day with the top news stories right now, plus original features, a podcast, videos and more.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In brief Waymo told senators that human operators overseas provide guidance to its vehicles in difficult situations but do not [&hellip;]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":61590,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[220],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-61589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tien-dien-tu"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61589\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/61590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hbbgroup.net\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}