[sitharus]

At the moment in every jurisdiction I’m aware of the driver is always considered as “in charge” of the vehicle no matter what assistance functions are being used. It’s the driver’s responsibility to avoid collisions in all cases.

If you have a collision and your vehicle is judged at fault by whatever authority does it in your area the you are liable.

[digitalPhonix]

Mercedes Drive Pilot (“SAE Level 3”) is certified on some very specific stretches of insterstate in California to not require the driver to be responsible.

https://www.mbusa.com/en/owners/manuals/drive-pilot

Requirements:

- Stop and go traffic (or less than 40mph?)

- On some specific sections of highway

- Driver doesn’t need to monitor but must be ready to take over with 15(?) seconds of the system requesting

> Mercedes-Benz is assuming liability for any crashes or incidents that occur while the autonomous system is active

[mannykannot]

That last criterion most assuredly will not be matched here.

[knowitnone3]

that's really dumb of Mercedes take on that liability for little benefit - sell more cars, make more profit? My prediction is MB drops this or goes bankrupt in the next 10 years.

[charcircuit]

What if there is no driver because the car is self driving?

[gegtik]

I assume the same as if the car owner put a brick on the gas pedal and there was no driver when it had an accident

[sitharus]

Well that will depend on your local laws, but to my knowledge except for certain authorised pilot programs all cars on the road must have a driver.

Where I live if you are in the driver’s seat no matter if you were actually actively driving you are considered to be the driver. This has been well established here in drink-driving cases, but you’d have to ask a lawyer for your area.