Remote drivers intervene in unusual situations
**The takeaway: As robotaxis and other AI-based technologies proliferate, so does the myth that these systems are fully autonomous. During a recent Senate hearing, industry leader Waymo provided the latest reminder that AI relies on human labor – often low-paid – more than people realize. **
Waymo's chief safety officer, Mauricio Peña, recently noted that when the company's robotaxis encounter unusual situations, they may request real-time input from a remote response agent, receiving human guidance when needed. While some of the contractors work in the US, many operate from other countries, such as the Philippines.
The admission is another example of human workers, often contractors, supporting supposedly autonomous AI systems from behind the curtain. Tesla's robotaxis still rely on human monitors sitting inside each vehicle.
Contract labor has been at the heart of AI since OpenAI sparked the latest wave of investment in the technology several years ago. ChatGPT relied heavily on workers from across the world to train its underlying large language model, often for as little as $15 an hour with no benefits.
Filipino remote workers also oversaw most of the orders taken through Presto Automation's supposedly autonomous fast-food drive-thru system. Meanwhile, Amazon's ill-fated Just Walk Out technology, which claimed to handle physical purchases automatically without involving cash registers, actually relied upon workers in India to monitor customers.
Tesla's robots, the primary reason why the company is discontinuing its most popular vehicles, became arguably the most notorious example of this phenomenon in late 2024. At the company's "We, Robot" event, the robots admitted that they still relied upon human intervention, and a video of a unit falling over after mimicking the motion of its remote operator removing their headset went viral.
However, the senators grilling Peña at the hearing were less concerned about the use of remote workers than the fact that many were not American.
Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey called the employment of foreign remote workers "completely unacceptable." While input lag from workers operating halfway across the world presents a safety issue, lawmakers were also concerned about Waymo's connections to China and other foreign countries.
Although Tesla uses its own cars, Waymo employs vehicles from various countries, including China. The decision drew suspicions that the Alphabet-owned company is attempting to circumvent import restrictions on Chinese vehicles. When asked about the use of internet-connected Chinese cars on American roads, Peña emphasized that the autonomous driving systems are installed in the US.
Correction (Feb 10, 2026): The original version of this article described Waymo vehicles as "switching control" to remote drivers in unusual situations. Waymo says its remote fleet response agents do not directly operate vehicle controls, but instead provide real-time contextual information that the autonomous system uses while remaining in control of the vehicle. The article has been updated to clarify this distinction.
Waymo loves to say this, but continues to hide behind the fact that another team actually can drive the car. Its used for emergencies so they can do things like move it out of a highway lane to a shoulder.
They only ever admit its possible when talking to congress though, otherwise its always its not possible while referencing the team that cant.
To be clear im not saying having that capability is bad, but they're bending words to hide they can.
'it is possible, in emergencies, for the cars to be directly operated remotely' is a far cry from 'cars are often directly operated'.
The first is describing a rare occurance dealing with exigent circumstances, the other is describing the default mode of operation.
The implication in the headline, article and in the responses of most of the top comments (at the time I made my first comment, at least) was that the cars are driven by workers despite being marketed as autonomous. The article included a correction, clarifying the situation, but it seems that most of the aforementioned commenters didn't get to the bottom of the article.
The cars are autonomous and people monitor them and fix errors. The cars are not operated by remote workers.
Ya a lot of people dont understand how those remote operators assist but dont drive it, but because of how waymo adamantly insists they cant be driven, you then also get people saying its impossible.
Its not, its just for emergencies and a different team.
Until they told congress they can in a footnote (like a legit small font footnote), everyone was insisting they cant.
I get the point that you're trying to make.
I was more taking aim at the misinformation implied by the headline and article that these cars are driven by people and are not autonomous. As in it's some scam where they are teleoperated taxi services pretending to be autonomous.
The technology used in Waymo vehicles has been being publicly developed by Google since 2007 or so. My early programming classes included lectures by Sergey Brin specifically on the topic of designing autonomous systems.
The technology is pretty cool and it's a shame to see people buying into the misinformation.
Definitely!
Also super cool you got to take some classes like that with some lectures by Sergey!
Honest question, how are you so certain what Waymo claims is actually true when their entire investment depends on it?
How can you tell their cars are rarely, if ever, driven by people. How do you know they don't make tons of small corrections daily?
Considering the financial implications for Waymo and the fact they seem to sing a tune (totally autonomous) to the public yet concede the cars can and have been driven remotely when perjury is on the table, I am inclined to believe that, at best, Waymo is painting a rosier picture than the actual truth
Waymo is the commercial product created from the Google Self Driving Car project which began over 17 years ago. There have been countless demonstrations of the technology that allows these cars to operate autonomously prior to it becoming a commercial venture. This isn't a scam where they're pretending to have the technology and using people behind the scenes.
There is no evidence that they are driven by people, except in rare cases. On the other hand, I've seen plenty of evidence that the autonomous systems work without human drivers (including taking a Waymo during a trip to the west coast).