New US Highway Code For Autonomous Cars

President Barrack Obama addressed the Pittsburgh Post Gazette, the site of Uber's trial of driverless cars, as he outlined the new policy. The new guidelines, issued by the US Transportation Department, replace a confusing mass of rules that often differ state-to-state. As well as ensuring higher standards of safety, Obama says, "The quickest way to slam the brakes on innovation is for the public to lose confidence in the safety of new technologies."

Some of the measures include the use of a black box that records what happen if they crash, similar to an airplane, as well as calls for the government to vet the code that controls the cars before they are given the all-clear to share the roads with humans. Data protection for customers is another issue highlighted, especially with fears of the technology being able to be hacked.

The policy is, at the moment, intended to be one that is upheld voluntarily, but it is expected that all developers of autonomous cars will comply, as it is a step towards a national framework for the regulation of autonomous cars. A summit will be held in Pittsburgh on 13th October to talk with car makers about how to speed up the use of autonomous vehicles.