Is Your Tesla Watching You? Privacy Laws and Autopilot Concerns in the Spotlight

According to industry sources, the Personal Information Protection Commission investigates whether companies like Tesla, which develops and manufactures autonomous vehicles, comply with and infringe upon the Personal Information Protection Act under South Korean law.

In particular, they plan to confirm with companies with headquarters abroad to what extent personal information is transferred overseas. The Commission has announced plans to complete this investigation by the second half of this year and make adjustments if any problems are found.

Recent large-scale incidents related to the Personal Information Protection Act, such as the “Line incident” and the Kakao personal information leak, are drawing attention to the Commission’s investigation.

This investigation mentions Tesla explicitly because It has installed eight cameras inside and outside its vehicles to enhance its autonomous driving system, Autopilot. Tesla uses these cameras to capture 360-degree external views and compile this data into a big data set, which is then used to advance autonomous driving technology through deep learning.

While many vehicles have black boxes that also record front and rear situations onto memory chips, a clear difference is that these recordings are not transmitted externally. Therefore, the Commission is reportedly checking whether any vehicles manufactured by Tesla have captured various personal information, including the faces of unspecified individuals, while driving in Korea and whether this data has been transmitted to the U.S. headquarters.

There could be problems if information that individuals did not want to be captured or made public, such as being photographed without consent at a specific time and place. This could particularly be a violation of the Personal Information Protection Act revised in September last year.

South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Act is a law designed to protect individual privacy and promote the rights of data subjects by establishing regulations related to the protection of personal information. It was first enacted in 2011 and has been revised several times since.

The regulation related to this investigation, revised last September, restricts filming personal video information in public places for business purposes. It only allows it in cases of disasters, crimes, or similar situations, and only if the fact of filming is indicated and not refused.

In other words, if autonomous vehicles like Tesla film unspecified individuals without consent, it could be a problem as it violates this regulation. Also, transferring South Korean personal information overseas could be an issue.

There could also be controversy over the infringement of portrait rights. If the faces in the filmed video are obscured or dealt with so that identities are not revealed, the potential for personal information infringement is considered low. However, if the original video is transferred as is, it could infringe upon portrait rights. An official from the Commission explained, “We are conducting a preemptive investigation as we believe that it could be a problem if personal information, such as citizens’ faces and locations, is transferred overseas without permission when filmed on the street.”

According to Article 71 of the Personal Information Protection Act, a person who processes sensitive information, provides personal information to a third party without the information subject’s consent, or knowingly receives personal information can be sentenced to up to 5 years in prison or fined up to 50 million won (approx. $37,000). This law could restrict autonomous vehicle manufacturers if they transfer personal information to overseas headquarters.

Among autonomous vehicle developers, Tesla, in particular, has been embroiled in ongoing controversies over personal information infringement overseas. According to foreign media outlets such as Reuters, testimonies have emerged that nine Tesla employees viewed videos filmed to develop autonomous driving technology through internal messengers. These videos reportedly included footage of a naked male customer approaching a vehicle, prompting criticism against Tesla.

According to the industry, Tesla has chosen autonomous driving as its growth keyword this year rather than its electric vehicle sales target. This is interpreted as Tesla’s intention to lead innovation centered on software technology, as the low-cost offensive of Chinese electric vehicles has pushed it back.

Tesla has also announced its goal to focus on the RoboTaxi business, an autonomous driving taxi service expected to be unveiled in August, to fuel new growth. Although there is a risk of investing in astronomical resources to differentiate from other companies, it is believed that they aim to grow the autonomous driving sector.