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Comment by Casseres | Hacker News Reader

Can you coverup/unplug the sensors and unplug the cellular modem?

If you watch recent crash test videos carefully, quite often you will see that the frontal camera is duct-taped over. If you don't do this, the car will refuse to be driven into the wall (due to automatic emergency braking). The future is here: you have to blindfold a car if you want to intentionally crash it.

Perhaps in future, they'll bring the wall to the car instead.

The future is now. Some side impact crash tests ram a special sled into the side of a stationary target vehicle.

https://www.iihs.org/iihs/ratings/ratings-info/side-test

I wonder if in the future we'll have relaxed safety requirements because cars will be good enough at preventing things like head on collisions.

I suspect, from pictures seen on the internet, that the cellular modem antenna can be disconnected if I pop out the center console. This is quite a bit of trouble, with a pretty strong "warranty voided" feel to it. I intend to try it.

I wouldn't know where to find the microphone.

Just find where it plugs in. All the wires go to the same few places.

The microphones usually have visible coverings in the headliner. However if privacy is your concern, just disabling the celluar modem should be enough.

As for voiding any warranty, should a problem arrise, it's up to the manufacturer to prove that whatever you did caused damage. Just taking apart and reassembling a console correctly will not void your warranty. "Warranty Voided if removed/opened" labels are not legally-enforceable in the US.

Just look for Youtube videos on how to take it apart (or look for repair videos for other items in the console).

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