When a driverless car causes an accident, who should be held responsible and how should the punishment be determined?

The Google driverless car accident in 2016 sparked a debate about the liability and punishment of driverless cars. Some argue that when a driverless car causes an accident autonomously, the driverless car itself should be held responsible, not the company or passengers. Advances in legal and ethical standards are important alongside technological perfection.

 

February 23, 2016. This is the day that a driverless car being developed by Google was involved in an accident in San Francisco, and the company was held liable. The driverless car Google was developing misjudged whether a bus coming from the opposite direction should yield to it. Google’s driverless car was at fault.
A driverless car is a car that can navigate the road and reach its destination without the need for a driver. Driverless cars are also known as self-driving cars. Driverless cars are equipped with devices such as video cameras and global positioning systems (GPS) that can recognize road signs on the inside of the windshield. They can also have laser scanners on their roofs to avoid passing cars and adjust their speed to match the speed limit. These technologies allow driverless cars to sense their surroundings and navigate autonomously without human intervention. Driverless cars detect their surroundings in real time and use a predictive system that utilizes GPS and precise maps. A computer, rather than a human, synthesizes all of these factors and controls the car’s driving mechanism.
Many companies, including Google, are working on driverless cars. It won’t be long before driverless cars are actually on the road. Even now, in some countries, driverless cars are being tested in certain areas and under limited conditions. This is not only technically feasible, but also based on legal and social consensus. For example, these tests are used to improve the safety of driverless cars, while at the same time accumulating data on the problems that may arise when driverless cars are actually on the road.
However, there are still issues that need to be resolved before driverless cars can actually be put on the road, including liability for accidents and penalties for driverless cars. The liability and punishment for accidents caused by the negligence of driverless cars needs to be actively discussed. Before driverless cars can actually drive on the road in earnest, it is necessary to come to a convincing conclusion and enact relevant laws. Of course, this is not to say that the issue of who is responsible for accidents caused by driverless cars has not been discussed before. Most discussions have centered on whether the driverless car company or the passenger should be held liable.
However, this issue extends beyond liability to a discussion of how society will accept and adjust to advanced technologies like driverless cars. If a driverless car is involved in an accident, and the driverless car manufacturer is held liable, this would place a significant burden on the manufacturer. This could force them to focus more on technological improvements to increase safety, but it could also stifle innovation by increasing fear of adopting new technologies.
However, I believe that in the case of driverless cars that do not require human intervention at all, the liability may lie with the car itself, not the company or the passengers. Driverless cars will combine artificial intelligence and information and communication technology. The fact that artificial intelligence technology is incorporated into driverless cars may mean that the judgment made by the driverless car based on the road conditions may not be the result of the intention of the company that made the driverless car. In such a case, it is questionable whether the company that manufactured the driverless car can be held fully responsible. Also, if the driverless car makes all the decisions, the passengers cannot be held responsible. Therefore, I believe that the driverless car should be held partially responsible for accidents caused by the driverless car’s negligence.
Legally, liability refers to the requirement for an actor to be blamed by society for committing an offense. In addition, the criminal law specifies whether a person can be held liable or not as the capacity to be held liable. If driverless cars are commercialized in the future, there may come a time when the driverless car is held responsible for an accident. At that time, the law will need to be amended to include the AI technology of the driverless car as the responsible party. In addition, when the time comes to hold driverless cars responsible, the issue of punishment for driverless car negligence will also need to be discussed. Punishment is meant to punish the person responsible for the crime and prevent the crime from recurring. In fact, many people would doubt whether it is possible to punish a non-human driverless car and whether it would be useful, and many would not even think about it.
This raises an interesting question. When a driverless car causes an accident, is it enough to hold it liable for the accident? This also leads to the question of whether it can strengthen trust in the safety of driverless cars. If the only way to hold driverless cars accountable for accidents is through material compensation, this may not do much to prevent future accidents. Instead, it is more important to thoroughly analyze the reasons why driverless cars caused accidents and improve the system based on that data in order to reduce accidents.
However, I do believe that if driverless cars are to be held accountable, they should be punished, and that the punishment should be different from the punishment we currently give to people in criminal law. Related to this, we will also need to think about how to reduce the errors of driverless cars. For example, it may be necessary to stipulate that driverless cars that have caused more than a certain number of accidents should be taken out of service, and the system should be overhauled and improved.
If a driverless car is at fault for an accident, it should be held accountable. Otherwise, there will be wrongful victims of accidents caused by driverless cars, and it may lead to a situation where those who develop driverless cars will pay less attention to safety. Therefore, I believe that before the era of driverless cars controlling all driving situations, it is necessary to specify exactly who is responsible for accidents caused by driverless cars. There will be a lot of discussion and debate in this process, and I think we need to think about how to hold driverless cars accountable, what punishment to impose, and what form it should take.
Finally, in order for driverless cars to become a safe and reliable mode of transportation, not only will they need to be technologically mature, but also ethical and legal standards will need to evolve. This is a new paradigm shift for society as a whole, and it’s a question of how ready we are. The challenges and discussions ahead will not just be technical, but will require deep reflection on the relationship, responsibility, and trust between humans and machines.