Bills aimed at closing traffic ticket loophole for driverless cars get initial green light NBC 7 San Diego [Video]

Two separate California bills, seeking to add tougher regulations over the driverless car industry, got the greenlight this week to continue making their way through the legislature in hopes of ultimately moving to a full vote.

The bills come in the wake of a series of reports from the NBC Bay Area Investigative Unit, which raised serious safety and ethical concerns regarding oversight of the technology. 

Currently, transportation laws in California require traffic tickets to be issued to drivers. As NBC Bay Area reported last year, law enforcement has interpreted that to mean in the case of autonomous vehicles violating the rules of the road, no tickets can be written since there are no human drivers present.

“There’s no authority in the vehicle code to actually cite a company or to cite a car,” said Rep. Phil Ting, who authored legislation to close the apparent loophole.  “It allows law enforcement to cite companies similar to the way that we would be cited.”

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