Guest essay by Eric Worrall
My question – do you need good cellular internet coverage to be able to drive your Tesla? A surprise new Tesla issue might be a real problem for people in the middle of an emergency.
Server Error 500 sees some Tesla drivers locked out of their MuskMobiles
CEO blames ‘Increased verbosity of network traffic’
Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Sun 21 Nov 2021 // 23:58 UTC
Some Tesla drivers who fancied going for a spin on Saturday were unable to do so after an update to the cars’ companion app produced server errors.
Teslas don’t use conventional keys. Instead they require the presence of a fob, key card, or authenticated mobile phone app that links to the electric vehicles over Bluetooth. This is apparently easier and/or more convenient than a key, or something. Heck, everything’s better with Bluetooth, right?
Drivers that use the app to kcikstart their cars reported they could not activate their cars with their apps.
I’m experiencing 500 server error to connect my @tesla Model 3 on my iOS app in Seoul, S.Korea. Seems like this is a worldwide issue. @elonmusk
— Jaehwan Cho 조재환 (@hohocho) November 19, 2021…
Read more: https://www.theregister.com/2021/11/21/tesla_server_error_500_lockout/
Elon Musk to his credit jumped onto Twitter to personally field questions about the outage (h/t The Register).
Server error 500 is one of the most generic internet errors. It usually occurs when the website software crashes while trying to fulfil your request. On most web servers, Server 500 occurs when level system software captures complete failures of the application software layer, and wraps the failures in a “Server 500”, to try to provide some meaningful feedback to the end user.
My question, where does this unexpected vulnerability leave drivers in an emergency situation? If you need cellular coverage to connect your mobile to your automobile, to satisfy the security system, I’m sure we can all think of plenty of scenarios when cellular coverage might be unavailable.
Even if this problem only occurs during a botched software update, in my opinion it is a concern.
Of course, my experience of a major power outage caused by a big flood nine years ago was cellular tends to die about 48 – 72 hours after the electricity dies, so maybe by the time your Tesla security system internet connection breaks down, you don’t have any charge in your vehicle battery anyway.
It is not just your vehicle security system you have to worry about, if you live in California. California recently passed a law outlawing gasoline backup generators and mandating zero emission emergency equipment, so batteries everywhere.
Thinking about the problems Tesla drivers just experienced over the weekend, I’m kindof glad I can start my gasoline vehicle with an old fashioned automobile key. During the last big outage, my gasoline vehicle had the range to keep me mobile for multiple short trips to the shop and the local gas station.
Speaking of the title photo, the vast majority of the time I see a rollback tow truck driving around with a vehicle on it that vehicle’s been a Tesla. Saw two in just the past couple weeks, and one of them was smashed pretty good in the front end.
Aw – poor Eric, still living in that hell hole of Californica?
Bluetooth? It’s not very hard to hack Bluetooth nowadays.
I did wonder when something like this would happen. Quite a giggle-snort for today!!!
Thank you!!!
Not enough “glam” in the world to get me near those things… ever!!!!
The other day I was denied entry to a store because I didn’t have a vaccination certificate on a smart phone to show the guy on the door.
Echos of living in occupied France: ‘halt papiers!’.
My point is that the internet is evolving from a servant to a master.
Not at home in Manitoba now, instead enjoying nice fall weather in eastern Kansas. Read in our provincial news that an MLA (member legislative assembly) was denied entrance to a restaurant because she showed only her paper copy proof of vaccination when the restaurant demanded that she show her QR code which she’d not put on her phone. She complained that she had been into other restaurants without issue but was still refused. So not only do we have to be vaccinated to “eat in” in Manitoba (take out not needed) but you have to have the “correct” government proof.
Even having the provincially issued QR card won’t necessarily work. I got to be one of the first ones verified at an event, and the guy doing it couldn’t get his app to read my card. In the end he had to move his table outside, there was too much steel on the building for his phone to work the app inside. Good thing it was nice weather, not like today. It’s a little brisk in Manitoba.
“The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.”
Seems that all our devices now need apps that monitor what other apps are looking for and scraping our details to sell to ne’er-do-wells.
Since I was old enough to follow French politics, nearly everything right of Lenin was compared with “les heures les plus sombres” (occupied France, when the Jews were deported).
But now that there are actually comparable policies put in place, comparison is verboten. For fears of trivializing you know what. Not that the Jewish orgs cared when it was actually trivialized (not that any Jew I can find on social media actually cares what the alleged Jewish orgs say or do, either).
I use a mechanical non-circuit driver KEY to open my doors if the key FOB battery runs low. Keys have always worked for me, they do not require the Internet or connectivity, and they are very reliable. I don’t want my car connected to the Internet. Literally.
I greatly prefer a map using a disc and satellites for location (traffic conditions never seem to help me as the alternate routes are always worse), I don’t need satellite radio, and when my car is experiencing a problem I connect a small diagnostic computer to it. None of the “modern” advances means squat to me expect to make things more complex and more likely to break down. Cars continuously become harder to work on…you replace entire $1,000(xN) modules instead of replacing a $5 part now.
If Tesla would build an “electric car” that had a small gasoline driven generator in it I might consider it assuming cost was not ridiculous – otherwise their products are just toys to me. I think I would wait for the next generation of batteries anyway as hundreds of pounds of potentially explosive impossible to put out batteries which spontaneously ignite kind of makes me nervous. Call me a worry-wart.
“If Tesla would build an “electric car” that had a small gasoline driven generator in it I might consider it assuming cost was not ridiculous”
That’s the Volt.
The volt is not a Tesla product, so isn’t an intelligence response to any sentence that starts with “if Tesla would …”
The point was that such a car already exists.
The discussion was specifically about what Tesla does or does not build (Notice the sentence, that you yourself quoted, began with “if Tesla would build”) so, sorry, but Volts are irrelevant as Tesla does not and will never be the builder of them (just like they do not and never will build Corvettes, Mustangs, VW beetles, or any other model from any of the other auto manufacturers. They literally do not apply to what Tesla does, could, or would build.
If they can turn your car off on accident, they can do it on purpose.
It may even be a different ‘they’ than one imagines.
Which has always been one (only one though) of my big concerns about “smart” cars
I wouldn’t worry about this. Musk will fix it; he always does.
He did, and very quickly. He gave seriously personal, and quickly delivered, customer support to his customers who were stupid enough not to carry an offline backup method that was provided. I’ve no love for him or Tesla or their products, but this story is wildly misleading and just Tesla bashing. WUWT is normally better than this.
Please desist in this pointless chasing of your short-selling, Eric. It does not make you look good.
Seconded.
Connectivity to one’s wheels can take many forms.
Perhaps just a simple case of “I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that”.
so here in WA there are very large gaps in cellular coverage so you can forget this BS on the electric superhighway between perth and broome
You don’t even need to worry about it. Just don’t rely on only the phone app. It’s not difficult.
Are we so @ur momisugly#%& lazy that we can’t insert a key to start the car? And those rear deck lids that you need to push a button that you can’t see in the dark so the &%$#@ur momisugly thing will take several seconds to close instead of just reaching up and slamming it shut.
The new Ford hybrid we bought has 17 buttons on the steering wheel, 18 if you count the horn. There’s two of them that I haven’t figured out what they do.
Well, you COULD read the manual…but that takes all the fun out of it. I found a button in my 2011 truck after owning it for 6 years I had never used and I had no idea what it was for. I eventually figured it out, then I went to the manual to see if I had overlooked any other buttons! LOL
Steve my acura manual is over 500 pages, much of which is useless BS or instructions to see the dealership. And then there is a 260 page manual for the Nav system …. just stupid information overload.
And then the stupid heated seats turn off everytime u shut the car down and so if u use the remote start to start in the cold u get into a warm car with leather seats that are still colder than a witch’s t!t. The problem is a result of the previous owner putting in an after market remote start. A frosty -6C here today.
Piggyback carbon emission at the source rather than shared/shifted in the conventional Green mode.
What can be started using an app, can be shut down via an app…
Who knew what fun Tesla vehicles can have?
Once organized crime obtains the critical software, they’ll be shipping more Tesla vehicles and parts to 3rd world countries.
i.e., Teslas accidently started up via an app and drove away to an off the grid, cell signal blocked chop shop.
Gee, my $30,000 Subaru has an emergency key in the fob and my Daughter’s Miata has one in the her card. If only the engineers at Tesla could figure out a way to do that.
Because we have a technology doesn’t mean it’s wise to use it.
This isn’t going to help move Tesla out of the relegation zone.
Tesla is second-to-last in reliability as Consumer Reports says Elon Musk-led company has its ‘fair share of problems’
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-10217643/Tesla-electric-SUVs-poor-scores-Consumer-Reports.html
“When technology is master, we shall reach disaster faster” Piet Hein
What a perfect lose-lose scam for the middle class. The taxes of the middle class subsidize the purchase of obscenely expensive electric play cars of the wealthy class so the latter can cruise around town signaling their superior virtue to each other at trendy spots that are economically off limits for the middle class. Then the virtue signalers go home and recharge their depleted batteries by plugging them into the increasingly unstable fossil energy base loaded electrical power grid caused by political mandates to accept unreliable and unpredictable wind and solar energy production which only drives up residential electricity costs for the middle class.
Having a car that requires a computer, several thousand miles away, to be working correctly doesn’t sound like reliable transportation to me.
FWIW, most recent model cars have an electronic key fob and push button start. My Toyota Avalon key fob includes a backup key which gets you into the car, but won’t start it. The ignition system is supposed to detect a valid key fob is present even if the fob battery is dead and allow you to start the vehicle. I did not test this recently when I began receiving “low key fob battery” warnings occasionally — I replaced the battery instead. I suppose I should be more curious and verify the fob will work with the battery removed.
All of this is entirely self-contained between the vehicle and the key fob; no cellular connection is required. ET does not need to phone home to let you in your car or start the engine.
I tried it with a dead FOB on my daughter’s 2008 Toyota Camry Hybrid and the RIF start technology works fine.
Happened with my NEW Honda Civic with a dead battery in the Key FOB. Car started up fine at home. Went to the mall. after shopping the fob did not work. Tipple A to the Rescue. $15 for a new(?) battery for the fob. Now have a new battery in every car and replace the FOB battery and the “Spare” every year.
U should be getting 3 to 5 years out of those FOBs …. make sure the FOBs are stored far enough away from the cars that the FOBs aren’t “talking ” to the car constantly. ie don’t have the FOB on a key rack at the garage door or it may be too close.
Also u should get lots of warning of low FOB battery before an actual failure.
Are u paying the extra for a lithium FOB battery which is much longer life?
Speaking of “Tesla owners”, whatever happened to that modernistic Tesla pickup truck (the “Cybertruck”) that was supposed to be released in 2021?
But then again, many early adopters may be content to be virtual owners of a virtual vehicle.