Autonomous vehicles are in danger of being turned into “weapons”, leading governments around the world to block cars operated by foreign companies, the head of Baidu’s self-driving car programme has warned.
Qi Lu, chief operating officer at the Chinese internet group, said security concerns could become a problem for global carmakers and technology companies, including the US and China.
“It has nothing to do with any particular government — it has to do with the very nature of autonomy,” he said on the sidelines of the Consumer Electronics Show last week. “You have an object that is capable of moving by itself. By definition, it is a weapon.”