A viral video showed a man repeatedly causing a Tesla Cybercab to slam on its brakes by jumping into the middle of the road – raising concerns that pranksters could pose a serious problem for the new driverless vehicles.
The video, which has racked up 1.3 million views and counting on X, shows the unnamed, paunchy man hopping into the street in front of a moving Cybercab and then back onto the sidewalk.
The robotaxi repeatedly slams on the brakes before eventually sitting in the middle of the street with its hazard lights on while a standard car with a driver pulls around.
It’s one of the first hiccups to pop up since Elon Musk released gold-colored Cybercabs into the streets of Austin, Tex., last week – a generation of autonomous vehicles with no steering wheels, no brake pedals and no straightforward way for humans to take control in an emergency.
Jesse Cohen, senior financial analyst at Investing.com, re-posted the video online and warned that it could be “a big issue going forward with Tesla robotaxis.”
“Any attention seeking [sic] lunatic can continue to do this with zero accountability and delay peoples’ rides and cause accidents,” he wrote in a post on X.
Other concerned social media users worried that a rise in anti-Tesla ne’er-do-wells could cause a spate of traffic accidents.
“The types of people who do this are very dumb. Sadly, posting a video will likely give more dumb people ‘an idea,’” one person wrote in a social media post.
Another said: “There should be a reasonable penalty for this.”
Some called on the Austin Police Department to take action.
Musk’s automaker has been testing robotaxis in several markets around the country, all but the latest model equipped with traditional steering controls with a human driver on-board. The Austin launch marked the first fully autonomous rollout.
Immediately following the debut, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration launched an audit into Tesla’s certification that its new Cybercab meets federal safety standards.
The Cybercab has been lauded as a key facet of the company’s long-term path to growth as it has struggled with slumping sales of its electric cars.
Musk has said the company will transform into a broader tech firm focusing on artificial intelligence and humanoid robots.