Police in Oakland, California are already using a new tool that Tesla invented for driving aid and security: sophisticated surveillance systems. Police are even towing automobiles to get video footage from Tesla vehicles in order to compile evidence. This practice is driven by the car’s Sentry Mode function, which activates the outside cameras when motion is detected and captures high-quality footage that can be crucial evidence in investigations.
A recent San Francisco Chronicle report revealed that police investigations are turning to video evidence from Tesla vehicles. Noticing the Sentry Mode feature, police are now explicitly charging warrants to look at the footage that vehicles store. ‘In worst cases, where they cannot easily locate the owner, police admit to towing the Tesla to download the footages,” said Ben Therriault, president of the Richmond Police Officers Association. He also added that towing is generally a final resort but sometimes becomes preventative.
The increasing dependence on Tesla’s Sentry Mode has raised some issues of privacy as well as surveillance. Staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation Saira Hussain noted that taping of actions of third parties not related to any criminal investigations could inadvertently lead to their actions being scrutinized, raising ethical questions about the extent of police access to privately collected data.
Since July, the Oakland Police Department has secured Tesla vehicles as evidence on at least three occasions, using court orders to obtain footage. The department credits this footage with aiding several recent investigations, though it has not commented on the increasing number of warrants targeting Teslas.
For Tesla owners, if their car suddenly goes missing from its parking spot, it might be worth checking in with the local police. They could be collecting vital video evidence from their vehicle.
