What we found
Cruise Robotaxi: FCruise said safety drives everything they do.
On October 2, 2023, a Cruise robotaxi ran over a pedestrian who had been knocked into its path by a hit-and-run driver. The car detected an impact and braked — then attempted to "pull over," dragging the woman 20 feet at 7 mph before stopping on top of her leg as she screamed in pain. Cruise then filed a false report to NHTSA, deliberately omitting the dragging. Cruise waited 15 days to give the CPUC the full video. The DOJ charged Cruise under 18 U.S.C. 1505 — obstructing a federal investigation. Cruise admitted guilt and paid $500,000 to the DOJ, $1.5 million to NHTSA, and $112,500 to the CPUC.
Full Self-Driving / Cybercab Robotaxi: FElon Musk told customers their Teslas could drive themselves — just wait for a software update.
In December 2025, a California administrative law judge ruled that the name "Full Self-Driving" is "actually, unambiguously false and counterfactual." In August 2025, Judge Rita Lin certified a class action covering FSD purchasers from May 2017 to July 2024. In January 2025, Musk admitted that Hardware 3 — sold in millions of vehicles as "FSD-capable" — actually wasn't good enough and a retrofit would be needed. No retrofit programme exists and no refunds have been offered. Tesla faces up to $14.5 billion in total lawsuit exposure.
Waymo One Robotaxi: DWaymo says it blurs faces to protect your privacy.
The LAPD published raw Waymo footage marked "Waymo Confidential Commercial Information" on its YouTube page to identify a hit-and-run driver — unblurred. Mesa and Chandler police in Arizona have been using Waymo footage since 2016. At least nine warrants have been served to Waymo in San Francisco and Maricopa County. Waymo declined to tell WIRED how long it retains footage, whether it has shared data with federal law enforcement or the military, or how many cameras are inside its vehicles.
Zoox Robotaxi: DAmazon said its devices are "built to protect privacy." The FTC found Ring had zero safeguards stopping employees from watching any customer's cameras.
The FTC found Ring had "no safeguards in place to prevent employees and hundreds of contractors from having full access to videos from every customer." One employee viewed thousands of videos from at least 81 female users' cameras labelled "Master Bedroom" and "Spy Cam" — often for over an hour daily. Over 55,000 US customers faced hacking attacks on Ring devices. Alexa kept children's voice recordings indefinitely even after parents requested deletion, violating COPPA. More than 800,000 children had Alexa profiles. In December 2025, Ring partnered with AI surveillance firm Flock Safety to funnel neighbourhood footage to police.