Regulators of the US auto industry will open the investigation in more than 580 thousand Tesla cars.
Tesla is in the midst of scrutiny from the US traffic regulator for allowing its users to play games on their touch screens while driving.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) claims it received a complaint in August stating that live games and internet searches, which were supposedly restricted to passenger use only while the car was in motion, they could be played by anyone in the vehicle at any time .
Its Bureau of Defects and Investigations said in a report that it “confirmed that this capability has been available since December 2020 on Tesla ‘Passenger Play’ equipped vehicles .”
Thousands of cars under investigation
Because of this, the NHTSA study is being applied to 580,000 Tesla vehicles , including Model 3, Model S and Model X models sold between 2017 and 2020.
Playing on the touch screen, equipped with the power of a current-generation console , “can distract the driver and increase the risk of an accident,” the report said.
The New York Times reported earlier this month that Tesla updated the playable video games in most of its vehicles in a wireless software update this summer. The update allowed some of the games to be played on the center touchscreens while the vehicles were in motion. Before the update, Tesla games could only be played with a parked vehicle.
According to the update, the assistance asks if the player will be a passenger and not the driver who will access the titles, a highly falsifiable mechanism in any sense.