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Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

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Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#271

Post by lx3459683 »

matthewaveryusa wrote: post #223

So basically the code base and politics of any large (successful) company. I wouldn't want to work with this dude. It's one thing to talk shit with your coworkers and another to do it online. I'm sure everyone is trying their best and all I'm reading are rantings from an ivory tower troll that did nothing to try and change things. I'm no fan of Tesla and I've shorted them so I guess thanks?

> So basically the code base and politics of any large (successful) company.

How does that invalidate anything of what he said or vindicate Tesla exactly? Do you believe that because some large companies are shitty places to work that everyone should just accept it as the status quo and shut the fuck up about it? Why are you expecting a single employee to try to 'change things' and why do you think that him speaking up about the issues is not an attempt to do just that?

I don't get your attitude at all.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#272

Post by Apocryphon »

watwut wrote: post #232
gerardnll wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Capitalism. Need for money and results. I don't think that anybody wants to burnout anybody, it's just the pressure of the whole system I guess. Money pushes to do things fast. Shareholders and clients to keep happy.

Burning out people at large rate is not effective and persistent crunch is contraproductie. It is less of capitalism and more of wishfull thinking combined with wish to be seen as tough manager.

I'd say it's the pace in which modern capitalism operates at, particularly in tech. When the rate of production goes higher and higher due to automation and a global outsource-able workforce, the shareholders chase after higher and higher profits.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#273

Post by coldtea »

mikeash wrote: post #177
coldtea wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Tesla’s infotainment and IT infrastructure is unrelated to their safety Because drivers can't get distracted and crash because of a failure in the infotainment and IT infrastructure?

If that's the standard, then almost everything becomes safety critical. Drivers can easily get distracted by malfunctioning smartphones or apps. (Or, for that matter, properly functioning smartphones or apps.) Yet the prior discussion was based on the idea that things like iPhones and Facebook aren't safety critical the way this is.

>If that's the standard, then almost everything becomes safety critical.

Almost everything in a cars front panel and dashboard can be. I've read somewhere that people have been killed even because of something as quaint as the wrong placement of car ashtray.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#274

Post by coldtea »

radicaldreamer wrote: post #199
coldtea wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why is this interesting or surprising? Of course almost all challengers have hacky tech under the hood because they don't have the resources First, we're talking about a multi-billion dollar company here (they've raised ~ 15 B), not some small "challenger". Second, your example is the iPhone and Facebook. Those don't have the potential to kill their owners or run over people.

That’s what it takes to be a challenger in that space. For example, most biotech series As are $100M, because that’s just what it takes to compete (but/lease equipment etc.).

"Challenger" was used to imply lack of resources for improving software quality.

We can't have them be both challenger in that sense, and accept that challenger in their case means multi-billions.

Challenger or not, $15 B doesn't explain a totally crappy software engineering process and result even if its just for the infotainment system.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#275

Post by v_petkov »

karpodiem wrote: post #55
stingraycharles wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a naive perspective. I've heard many similar stories from friends that work in the German automotive industry, and I think you would be surprised how many payment systems are tied together (e.g. (insecure) FTP servers to sync daily payments). Every organization has these types of things internally. As an engineer, I don't like it, but it's a fact of life.

Banks can reverse transactions if they want to. Tesla's cavalier attitude towards manufacturing has yielded a 14% first pass through rate on the Model 3 line (which is abysmal and may bankrupt the company along with declining M3 demand) vs. the industry standard of ~80% FPT rate. Source - https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-hit-model-3-target-by-... We're at the point in the Tesla story similar to that of 2008 wher…

Hope your short position is huge.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#276

Post by lx3459683 »

Uhhrrr wrote: post #253
haberman wrote: post #228

Is there any corroboration of this? Like that this is even someone who worked at Tesla? I'm certainly not discounting that it could be real, but with so many people shorting Tesla, any uncorroborated information should be looked at with a high degree of skepticism.

Here is one skeptical person: https://www.reddit.com/r/EnoughMuskSpam/comments/99sbwa/form... My personal expectation that it's all true is about 60% right now. Some of the figures could be exaggerated or misremembered, but most of the hackiness described is plausible.

This comment hits the nail on the head:

> As a long-ago ex-Googler I find it amusing to watch employees name-drop where they work, always with some underlying subtext implying authority [...] Parent comment doesn't simply imply this but explicitly uses it as the basis for calling OP out. It's amusing because the namedrop is always accompanied by some claim they felt they couldn't support solely through a sound argument.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#277

Post by linseed »

lowry wrote: post #259
arcticfox wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it possible that the timing on your contact with them made a difference? It seems that NASA/NHTSA concluded in 2011 that it was a mechanical defect, but research concluding in 2013 showed that it was totally possible to have been caused by the software. At least according to the summary based on sources used for Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009%E2%80%9311_Toyota_vehicle...

Hey, The page you refer to has a section "NHTSA and NASA Investigation Verdict" and it says nothing about the software bugs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009%E2%80%9311_Toyota_vehicle...

Perhaps have a look at Koopman https://users.ece.cmu.edu/~koopman/pubs/koopman14_toyota_ua_... and Barr http://www.safetyresearch.net/Library/BarrSlides_FINAL_SCRUB...

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#278

Post by extrapickles »

eyeareque wrote: post #239

Do NDAs really just expire after three years like this ex Tesla employee claims? Something tells me that he will be sued very soon.

They can. Typically they are 2-5 years, but you have to read the specific NDA to be sure.

I will never sign a NDA that doesn't expire in <10 yrs after cessation of work, as its just too risky to indefinitely hold any information secret to the level required in most NDAs. Management changes, and what the current management is fine with, future management could not, or you do some work that the company doesn't like 10 years down the road and they dig through the filing cabinet looking for something to hit you with.

Re: Former Tesla Firmware Engineer Discusses the System

#280

Post by thsowers »

hacknat wrote: post #46

Wow, The most revealing thing, I think, is the lack of central server security. Sounds like it wouldn’t take almost any effor to MitM a Tesla car.

Interesting to note that Tesla's bug bounty program specifically excludes "TLS/SSL Issues, including BEAST BREACH, insecure renegotiation, bad cipher suite, expired certificates..."

[0]: https://bugcrowd.com/tesla

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