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Comment by eldaisfish | Hacker News Reader

If something is opened or modified without manufacturer consent, there is no question of liability because there is none.

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Except history hasn't really played out that way. Less serious but Grand Theft Auto had a sex game added to one of their titles that wasn't supposed to be accessible by gamers. People figured out how to unlock it using a modified save file. This ended up in all sorts of legal liability to the company: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_Coffee_(minigame)

Hot Coffee is and was an absurd case with absolutely no merit behind it.

It only became a large issue because it was a social fad for politicians and mass-media to dogpile "evil gaming companies corrupting poor mindless children", and Rockstar in particular with the GTA series was one of the most popular targets of said social fad.

So if you're using unlocked a version of FSD that has been recalled and don't get an OTA update then any and all faults that may be traced back to FSD even if it was clear that this is a bug in the software (e.g. the reason for the recall) the vehicle owner has full liability?

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/02/16/tesla-recalls-362758-vehicle...

Software is a legal grey area as others pointed out. In your example, the vehicle owner modified the software version and used an unsupported one. The manufacturer cannot be liable when there is no legal contract.

The problem here is that this is functionally similar to using an outdated version of photoshop but the consequences are vastly different.

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