this post was submitted on 23 Aug 2026
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[–] RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 9 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago)

This article is 2/3 fluff. The majority is about convenience features, not safety.

That said, I recently moved from a ~15 year old car to a modern one, and have driven several newer models with the features described.

Adaptive cruise: it‘s often poorly designed. It brakes far too rapidly and abruptly should traffic or a car ahead slow, and there‘s absolutely no reason to apply as much throttle as it does should it decide acceleration is appropriate. Also for uphill driving the cruise control often drops into far too low a gear in order to maintain speed. It‘s more of a nuisance than an aid, and it‘s even worse if traffic increases or you‘re in a lane with jackasses that can‘t maintain a steady speed. Adaptive cruise attracts idiots, too. The new versions will stay engaged and slow to a complete stop. If the driver has set the following distance to maximum the car will stop with a 4-5 car distance from the car ahead. They‘re treating it like some kind of autopilot that will run the car for them.

Lanekeeping: there‘s a huge span of quality here. Some are shit, some are far too aggressive, some are “jerky” following a segmented plotted line rather than a smoother curve. They can overcorrect and really make for an unstable drive attempting to counter intentional driver input. Some “give up” and disengage with little warning, the audible alerts are often weak. Some briefly follow merge, exit, or widening lines for an additional lane pointing you off the road before they get confused and disengage with the car pointed in an unsafe direction.

Auto braking: in my experience it has engaged every time when I was already braking, or engaged when there was no need to brake. The few times I thought it should have engaged, it didn’t. It’s a nuisance at best, ineffective at worst.

Reverse cameras don’t provide a full picture and are awful in developing driver proprioception about the dimensions of their car. They’re fine for what’s immediately behind you, but use of mirrors and looking around is far better for backing out and looking for approaching people or cars. That said, I love the “360°” view ones. Those are great for centering oneself in a parking space.

So I completely understand why drivers don’t use them. They’re often low-quality, inappropriate overcorrections for the situation, and make for a worse ride and potentially even detrimental to safety. That’s saying a lot considering the quality of a lot drivers on the road today.

I run 80% of the time with adaptive cruise and lanekeeping off. I can’t disable the autobrake, if I could I would.

[–] noxypaws@pawb.social 4 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

I can't back up my own driveway with "maneuvering assist" enabled or it slams on the brakes every time it gets close to a completely harmless fern on the passenger side. Every time it happens it's so infuriating that I could actually scream. So it's now off.

[–] Routhinator@startrek.website 3 points 10 hours ago

Yeah, same. And this article is playing like thats on us.

[–] garretble@lemmy.world 3 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

So glad my 2019 car is a standard but still has CarPlay.

Like, CarPlay is about the most "smart" feature I need/want. I just want a good map and the ability to play podcasts and listen to music easily. That's it.

Since it's a standard the car couldn't get any of the "smart" features I didn't want anyway.

I'll drive the car, thanks.

[–] doingthestuff@lemy.lol 1 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

This is me too with my 2020 Crosstrek. A little screen for the backup camera that also shows the navigation and Spotify from my phone. No lane monitoring or any of that stuff. And I do like deciding when I want to shift.

[–] garretble@lemmy.world 1 points 10 hours ago

Heh, mine is a 2019 Crosstrek, so, yeah, I understand.

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 3 points 12 hours ago

I turn off all that shit for one reason: too many electronic nannies mean less attention is required to drive. I rarely even use old cruise control.

[–] noxypaws@pawb.social 1 points 11 hours ago

One interesting finding relates to driving modes. While almost all new cars have them, just 27.3 percent of respondents say they regularly use their vehicle’s driving mode. Those aged 25 to 34 were more likely to use them, at 38.3 percent.

so what, all these people are always driving in reverse...??

[–] MonkRome@lemmy.world 28 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

The problem with some of these "safety" features is they malfunction at such a high rate they seem more likely to kill me than save my life. They also don't anticipate future consequence in any way.

The collision detection malfunctions regularly giving a loud beep or applying breaks when nothing is ahead.

The lane departure does not understand situations where you had someone wander into your lane and you may drive onto the shoulder quickly before signalling. I don't need my car fighting me while im making the correct call. I also think having the car take over, even gently, is so startling that it could cause the accident it was meant to prevent. If I'm startled I might over correct and lose control. While that has never happened, with everything considered, it seems safer to leave some of these features off.

I don't need to be an early adopter on flawed technology that could get me killed.

[–] Thebeardedsinglemalt@lemmy.world 5 points 12 hours ago

The lane departure does not understand situations where you had someone wander into your lane and you may drive onto the shoulder quickly before signalling

This is one of the biggest things I hate about my parents car. You almost have to fight against the lane detection when when changing lanes, being in a merge lane, or more importantly when another car starts drifting into you lane. It's great if you're on a long haul but it's detrimental because it's conditioning you to not have to pay attention as much.

[–] tmyakal@infosec.pub 4 points 12 hours ago

I drove a rental that had collision detection in it. Three or four times, it suddenly slammed on the brakes for no discernable reason, and with no regard to how close/fast traffic behind me was moving. I had to pull off, download the manual, and figure out how to turn it off before the car killed me.

One of the most important things in safely operating a vehicle is using gradual, predictable movements. My car braking without my input makes predictable movement impossible.

[–] capnbubblebuns@sh.itjust.works 20 points 1 day ago (2 children)

After my car suddenly slammed on the brakes for the third time on wide open highway while screaming warning beeps at me I went to the settings and disabled everything. I had enough "safety" thanks.

[–] HiTekRedNek@lemmy.world 4 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago)

Semi truckers have been fighting this for years. And they're not allowed to turn it off unless they own the truck. Most truckers work for someone else.

The typical scenario, approaching an overpass in broad daylight, the sensor sees the shadow on the road and freaks out, stomping the brakes.

[–] adhdsergio@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

Name and shame please!

[–] trk@aussie.zone 16 points 1 day ago

I had way more issues with phantom braking in the 3 months it was enabled than I've had with actually crashing in 20 years of driving.

I want graded licences so people who have no crashes don't get forcibly subjected to bad technology just because those that can't drive need it.

[–] tehn00bi@lemmy.world 3 points 19 hours ago

I have a car from 2020 with most of the “modern” safety features. I have most of them off, but I do like the radar cruise control, makes long trips less stressful since it will adapt to traffic in front of me.

[–] 0oWow@lemmy.world 27 points 1 day ago

Some of the safety tech has tried to kill me twice, due to glitching itself, so I have had to turn it off. 🤷‍♂️

[–] ragas@lemmy.ml 26 points 1 day ago

My only experience with a car that had lane-keeping assist was that the car actively tried to kill me by steering me into oncoming traffic.

That car also thought I was sleeping when I wore sunglasses and again tried to kill me by scaring me with the loudest beep to 'wake me up' again.

If that is how well this tech works it is not adding any safety. Quite the opposite actually.

I also really started to wonder how bad the government ageny that tests these cars operates to certify this safety risk on wheels.

[–] Devconsole@sh.itjust.works 32 points 1 day ago (5 children)

I've disabled safety tech in cars I drive because the signal to noise ratio was bad.

[–] Randelung@lemmy.world 19 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You're going over the speed limit, says the shitty sign recognition that missed the one outside that says otherwise.

You're tired, says the racist eye closure camera that can't deal with Asian eyes.

Your seatbelt is undone, says the sensor that can't discern between your backpack and a person. (To be fair, this one is just for the power of threes. Buckle in heavy objects. Secure your load.)

[–] Soggy@lemmy.world 1 points 12 hours ago

My seat sensor is capacitive so if I have something sufficiently wet (like chinese takeout) or my phone plugged into the charger with the cord slack on the seat it thinks there is a person and beeps incessantly.

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[–] smeenz@lemmy.nz 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 16 hours ago) (2 children)

In this topic, people not being able to spell 'brake'

[–] Thebeardedsinglemalt@lemmy.world 3 points 12 hours ago

If it's a white suburban kid with a blonde millennial mom it's spelled Breighkh

[–] pulsey@feddit.org 3 points 20 hours ago (1 children)
[–] pirat@lemmy.world 1 points 11 hours ago

Well, we are trying to brake the record!

[–] ouRKaoS@lemmy.today 30 points 1 day ago (1 children)

My "parking assist" feature got immediately turned off when it slammed on the brakes because I backed into a parking spot and it saw the concrete parking block 6ft behind me...

I got out of the car thinking an animal had ran under a tire where I couldn't see it, then figured out it was just the car being "helpful".

[–] Doom@lemmy.world 10 points 1 day ago

AND that's the problem with "safety" tech. It doesn't act as an assistant it acts as a nanny. A nanny that makes mistakes. Sometimes harmless, sometimes irritating, and sometimes dangerous. Each driver should be allowed to decide what level of assistance they need/want without being forced or shamed about it. If we can't trust drivers to drive then maybe we shouldn't have cars and should redirect resources to public transportation infrastructure instead. (Personally I'm very on board with the latter.)

[–] Don_alForno@feddit.org 32 points 1 day ago (20 children)

Maybe if half of it didn't spy on you ...

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[–] 01189998819991197253@infosec.pub 35 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

"Safety tech". OK. I was visiting a mate in the states, and the rental gave me a Nissan. Apparently, there's a lot of construction going on in that state, and the Nissan tried to literally run me, at 100kmh, into a median, because it recognized the (clearly) scratched off lane markers and not the (clearly) newly painted lane markers. I had to use nearly all my upper body strength (whatever little of it I had left after a 13hr trip), to force the wheel to the left and away from death. And that fucker bitched at me the entire time! would have 100% died. All because of their fucking "safety" tech. I turned that shit off as soon as I parked. All of it. I'm still so angry at them for that shit.

[–] Ibisalt@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I hate lane assist, its so irritating. Worst thing is: in my skoda you cant turn it off for good, every time you shut of the engine it resets to default, which means lane assist on.

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[–] cloudshouter@lemmy.zip 4 points 1 day ago

I know a couple people who one could describe as “twat” who turn off traction control and abs, thinking they are going to be rally drivers on the way to McDonalds. They tend to end up in the ditch.

Subaru has been good. The lane warning was the only thing we turned off because it was just obnoxious. If something is beeping constantly and erratically, what’s the point? The lane centering had a tendency to pull towards semis when passing but that seems to have been fixed in an update. The only other thing that is more a quality of life is a way easily and preemptively to turn off the backup warning and breaking assist when pulling a trailer.

[–] qevlarr@lemmy.world 100 points 1 day ago (3 children)

The safety tech is not mature enough, simple as. People turn it off because of the false positives and general nagging behavior

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[–] Pinguini@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

Whenever I get into a modern hire car the first thing I do after starting it is turn all the 'safety' features off. They either don't work well, are annoying, or both. Sometimes they're downright dangerous. It was a large part of the reason I chose to buy a slightly older vehicle when I needed to change my car. The later models all had the annoying stuff.

[–] pastermil@sh.itjust.works 55 points 1 day ago (2 children)
  • adaptive cruise control
  • AR HUD
  • driving mode

None of these were meant to save lives

Also, both lane assist and auto emergency brakes are mostly poorly implemented. Even the ones that aren't really bad don't fare well with the chaos of the roads.

Also, voice assistant is bullshit. You know what would be better? That's right, physical buttons.

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[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

and 41 percent use heated windshields.

What are they talking about here, the defroster?

[–] MonkRome@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

My car has micro wires in the front window, smaller than the ones in the back. Maybe it refers to this?

[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 1 points 13 hours ago

I feel like this is either talking about heated seats or a heated steering wheel and some AI couldn't parse out the difference when they used it to summarize the results of the study.

[–] BigDanishGuy@sh.itjust.works 23 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (10 children)

This makes me sound like I'm irresponsible. I'm not, I just happen to have a car with dangerously poorly designed "safety tech".

My car has sign recognition, cruise control, and lane keep assist. I use a single one, and one I can't turn off permanently.

Lane keep assist insists on making me drive way too far left, so I turned it off after it tried to kill me by forcing me into a super wide load truck coming towards me.

Cruise control keeps wanting to switch setting to the recognised speed limit. But it picks up all sorts of stuff. So driving by a highway on ramp will make it suggest that I put the speed limiter to 130km/h, on a 70km/h road. But turning off sign recognition requires me to go through several menus and is reset when I park.

On top of that the speedometer is 4-5km/h too slow, so I'll be going 84km/h according to the speedometer, my GPS says I'm going 80km/h, and I'll go by a sign and the speed limiter will pop up suggesting that I set it to 80. And btw that the speedometer is displaying a faster speed than I'm going, has nothing to do with wheel circumference. The car's odometer is spot on. If google maps says a trip is 300km then the odometer advances 300km, not 298 or 302.

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[–] db2@lemmy.world 199 points 2 days ago (9 children)

The lane keeper fucks up and tries to drive on the shoulder, driver turns it off, research group acts surprised that it's turned off

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Headline should read "One in five drivers switch off 'safety' tech meant to appease lawyers in a lawsuit-happy culture"

[–] Redditisbollocks@feddit.uk 77 points 2 days ago (8 children)

God, every time.

Lane keep assist. Don't tell me how to drive my own car.

You can't even show me the right speed limit due a sign on a different road that say 5MPH, when I'm on a 30MPH road, and suddenly you start beeping at me cause I'm going too fast?

Randomly flashing up the BRAKE! Warning for no reason at all?

None of this tech works correctly, and until it does, it all gets turned off every single time 8 start the engine.

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[–] Feathercrown@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago

This title is so misleading as to be incorrect

[–] sanzky@lemmy.world 23 points 1 day ago (4 children)

because they are awful!

I got a car 2 months ago and i’m incredible frustrated by the automatic cruise control. it has two modes “ICC” and “ACC”. I have no idea about the difference but the thing keeps switching between them and alerting me with a red alert every time!

I stopped using it after two weeks

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