European Regulators Review Tesla FSD Safety Data Amid Misleading Claims

Tesla has presented self-published safety statistics, which traffic-safety researchers describe as misleading marketing, to regulators in Sweden and the Netherlands while seeking European approval for its Full Self-Driving (FSD) system. This comes as the electric vehicle (EV) maker aims to regain market share in the region.

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A news agency examination found that Tesla Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk and other leaders have cited statistics claiming FSD is up to 10 times safer than human drivers. However, the review identified several invalid data comparisons that exaggerated these safety claims.

Correspondence obtained through public records requests shows Tesla presented these inflated safety data to some European regulators. The company approached RDW, the Dutch road regulator, in late 2024 to initiate the FSD approval process.

In a Nov. 2024 letter to RDW, Tesla included a link to its safety report and asserted that "increased usage" of FSD "leads to safer roads." Tesla charges a monthly subscription for FSD, a system that can drive itself under certain conditions but requires driver attention.

Following more than a year of testing and discussions with Tesla, RDW approved FSD for use in the Netherlands in April. The Dutch regulator is now pursuing EU-wide approval for Tesla.

RDW declined to comment on the issues identified with Tesla's safety statistics. However, the agency stated it "does not rely on marketing claims or external statistics" for its decisions.

RDW also affirmed it conducts its own "tests, analyses, and verifications" of the system on public roads and test tracks. The agency did not specify whether it assessed Tesla's United States safety statistics.

RDW said Tesla "collected a lot of data" during testing, which the agency "validated, tested, and audited all of this data." RDW did not disclose the type of data Tesla collected or what it measured.

Soon after the Dutch decision in April, Tesla Policy Manager Ivan Komusanac emailed Swedish regulators seeking similar FSD approval. He attached a slide presentation containing an exaggerated claim.

The presentation asserted that Teslas using FSD can travel over seven times farther between crashes than the average United States human driver. It also claimed FSD could have potentially saved 32,000 lives and prevented 1.9 million injuries.

Researchers interviewed stated these figures are highly misleading. They are based on the unrealistic assumption that every United States vehicle, including freight trucks and crash-prone motorcycles, would be replaced by an FSD-enabled Tesla car.

This assumption also presumes that every Tesla car is at least seven times safer than the vehicle it replaces.

The news agency examination also found Tesla exaggerates FSD's safety by comparing a crash rate in FSD-piloted Teslas that triggered airbag deployments to a United States crash rate for all vehicles, which includes far less-severe accidents.

The company also compares its cars to the average United States vehicle, which is significantly older than the average Tesla. This comparison distorts results because newer safety features in modern vehicles generally reduce crashes.

Anders Eriksson, an investigator at the Swedish Transport Agency, declined to comment on the data Tesla provided. Eriksson stated Swedish regulators "look beyond headline figures."

He added that any assessment of such a system would not be based "solely on aggregated safety claims, but on the overall evidence presented." The regulator did not answer questions about other evidence Tesla provided.

Dudley Curtis, a spokesperson for the watchdog group European Transport Safety Council, expressed concern after learning Tesla presented "unreliable safety data" from the United States to Swedish regulators.

Curtis suggested that if Tesla wishes to make safety claims, it should "give the data to a university, have it independently verified by a qualified researcher, and then let’s talk."

Tesla has indicated FSD approval in Europe is crucial for vehicle sales growth in the region. The EV maker is working to regain market share after sales declined last year.

The sales decline followed protests over Chief Executive Officer Musk’s political activities, including his support for far-right European political parties.

Failing to secure approval could hinder Tesla's ability to compete in a region where Chinese EV makers are steadily gaining ground.

In the coming months, representatives of 55% of member states, comprising 65% of the bloc's population, must vote "yes" for FSD to become legal throughout the EU. Individual member states can approve the technology independently in the meantime.

A regulator in Greece, which stated last month that the country aims to approve FSD, cited data "from the other side of the Atlantic." This data reportedly showed the system "ultimately leads to a very significant drop in accidents."

The Greek transport ministry did not answer questions about whether the data it cited originated from Tesla’s safety report.

Regulators in other European countries have received numerous communications from drivers citing Tesla’s safety statistics and urging swift FSD approval.

Several Tesla drivers wrote to Norwegian road regulators last autumn, citing Tesla’s vehicle safety report. One driver argued the technology is "significantly safer than average manual driving."

The driver also claimed FSD has the potential to "reduce traffic accidents by up to 90% and thus save lives on Norwegian roads."

Stein-Helge Mundal of the Norwegian Public Roads Administration responded to several Tesla enthusiasts. Mundal noted Tesla’s figures "are self-produced," making it "difficult to find correlation with the authorities’ accident statistics."

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* Tesla submitted self-published, misleading safety data to Dutch and Swedish regulators to secure FSD approval in Europe.

* RDW, the Dutch regulator, approved FSD for use in the Netherlands in April and is seeking EU-wide approval, while Swedish regulators are reviewing similar requests.

* Traffic-safety researchers and watchdog groups expressed concern over Tesla’s exaggerated claims, which include FSD being up to 10 times safer than human drivers.

Source: Reuters