(Thomas Fuller/Getty Images)

Tesla moved its “robotaxi” to the Bay Area and put a driver in the driver’s seat

Tesla doesn’t need a permit to have a human drive you around with supervised Full Self-Driving.

7/31/25 1:15PM

Tesla’s overhype machine continues to turn out the hits.

Earlier this month, when asked about Tesla’s autonomous ride service, CEO Elon Musk said the company’s limited Austin robotaxi service would be expanding to the Bay Area, pending regulatory approvals. Tesla doesn’t have those permits yet and correspondence between the company and California’s autonomous DMV branch viewed by Politico never use the word “robotaxi.” Tesla and Musk have made an announcement, nonetheless.

Today Musk said, “You can now ride-hail a Tesla in the SF Bay Area, in addition to Austin.” Pay attention to the language. People can now use Tesla’s Robotaxi app to ride-hail a Tesla. That Tesla will have a person in the driver’s seat touching the steering wheel. In other words, you can pay for a person to drive you around in a Tesla, using the company’s supervised Full Self-Driving software, which requires a driver to be in the seat, notably, and hold the wheel. That’s a far cry from true autonomous driving and something that basically already exists if you were to get in an Uber or a consumer’s Tesla that has enabled supervised Full Self-Driving in the state.

Below is a video posted yesterday from Tesla influencer Teslaconomics. Using the Robotaxi app, he summoned a Tesla with a driver in the driver’s seat. You’ll see the driver’s hands remain hovering on or near the steering wheel the whole time. It doesn’t have Robotaxi signage.

My first Tesla Robotaxi ride in the Bay Area, CA! 🔥 https://t.co/arZykKfNbZ
— Teslaconomics (@Teslaconomics) July 31, 2025

Also, the “you” who can now ride-hail in this case seems to mean friends and family of Tesla employees, or invited members of the public. The automaker’s Austin service was similarly not fully open to all potential customers. The Austin service was also not fully autonomous driving. Under the program Tesla operates there, a safety monitor who can stop the vehicle sits in the front passenger seat for every ride, and tele-operators can take over remotely.

Chris Stokel-Walker

Bot bias

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Companies are getting AI chatbots to smear their competitors

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Prediction markets have, predictably, been given a boost by the summer of sports

Major platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket have seen huge upticks in users of late, thanks in no small part to what’s felt like a recent sporting smorgasbord, with major competitions across hockey, basketball, and soccer soaking up fans’ time (and spending, clearly) at the outset of summer.

While gaming industry groups may not like it, there’s been a huge change in the methods people are using to put money on the big games, with everyone from fortunate NYC bar owners, to a far less fortunate Spanish supporter, turning to prediction markets to try and turn their sports know-how into cold, hard cash.

According to a new report from Adam Blacker for apptopia, that shift might have been even more seismic than imagined in the wake of the NBA and NHL finals and around the 2026 World Cup kicking off.

2026 World Cup Reverses Seasonal Lull for Sports Betting Apps

According to a new report from Adam Blacker for apptopia, that shift might have been even more seismic than imagined in the wake of the NBA and NHL finals and around the 2026 World Cup kicking off.

South by Southwest Conference and Festivals

Gold Tesla Cybercabs are piling up, but they’re not picking up passengers yet

Low-volume production started in April. Now people are noticing them more and more in the wild.

Rani Molla6/15/26

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TAKING ACCOUNTS

6/15/26

Britain announces social media ban for under-16s starting early 2027

The UK government plans to use the same model for the restrictions as Australia — but how successful has that case study been so far?

UK Prime Minister Announces Under-16s Social Media Ban

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Anthropic pulls Fable and Mythos access worldwide after Trump administration bars their use by foreign nationals

Only days after releasing two versions of its next-gen AI model, Anthropic has disabled them for users worldwide.

Anthropic says it received a Friday night order from the Trump administration to suspend access to the models for any foreign national (anywhere in the world) — a group that included some Anthropic employees. In response, the company turned off access to everyone.

Last week, the company released to the public its much-anticipated Claude Fable 5 model (and its restricted version Claude Mythos 5, which is still being tested with trusted partners). Anthropic said in a blog post announcing the action that officials cited national security concerns with the new models, while offering few specific details.

The post said that the government gave the company “verbal evidence of a potential narrow, non-universal jailbreak” of the public Fable 5 model. A jailbreak is a means by which users can evade restrictions built into the code to unlock prohibited functionality. Anthropic downplayed the significance of the attack, and said other major models, such as OpenAI’s GPT-5.5, could also be affected by the technique described.

Fears of these first Mythos-class models being misused are running high, after Anthropic warned the cybersecurity world in May that the advanced cyber capabilities of Mythos have rapidly discovered thousands of vulnerabilities in ubiquitous software, leading to the decision to restrict the full version of the model to a close group of trusted partners for testing.

This morning, Axios reported that Anthropic technical staff have flown to Washington to meet with White House officials to resolve the issue.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Trump administration’s decision to take action against Anthropic was prompted by discussions that Amazon CEO Andy Jassy had with officials, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. According to the report, Amazon researchers said they had been able to evade some of Fable 5’s security restrictions using specific prompts. Amazon is a major investor in Anthropic.

Anthropic is currently suing the US government to fight the Pentagon’s blacklisting of the company on national security grounds.

Statement on the US government directive to suspend access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5