But I am equally sure that someone will one day try to lie about having autopilot on to get out of a traffic accident.
Which is a great reason to start judging the claim a bit more skeptically than normal. Once the press latch on to a theme, they can be incredibly quick to make it an epidemic at the expense of due diligence.
Even if it was... it seems pretty clear this is the exact type of problem you'd expect to see a Tesla have. If you're at the point where you're doubting it simply because other people might know it's a problem... eventually you kind of lose the ability to function here, as the mere knowledge of doubt makes you doubt the doubt, and when does that end?
Hell, we've all heard lots recently about the media being so bad...