Chinese companies are aggressively developing autonomous vehicles. In August, China announced that it had issued 16,000 test licenses for driverless cars and opened up about 20,000 miles of roads nationwide for autonomous vehicle testing. But Chinese autonomous vehicle companies have also quietly been testing their technology on U.S. streets. Baidu, Didi, WeRide, Pony.ai and AutoX all have offices in northern California, right alongside many U.S. autonomous car outfits. Collectively, these five companies logged over 1.6 million test miles on California’s roads between 2017 and 2023, according to data from the California Department of Motor Vehicles, which is responsible for issuing test licenses for companies aiming to test autonomous cars in the state. Out of these five companies, Didi, is the only one that no longer has an active AV testing permit according to the DMV’s website. Michael Dunne, CEO and founder of consulting firm Dunne Insights, told CNBC that China had “carte blanche” when it comes to testing AVs in California. “They recognized that Silicon Valley was the cradle of autonomous vehicle technology,” Dunne said, adding, “They hired a lot of people who had previously been working for Apple or Tesla or Waymo or Cruise and said, ‘Let’s get the best talent in the world. We have funding, and we want to build a world-class company. Take that knowledge, bring it back to China, apply it to our massive home market, and we’re off and running.’” But now, concerns about the massive amount of data being collected by these cars and the potential implications for national security have led the U.S. government to propose a ban on Chinese connected vehicles. Missy Cummings, a former senior safety advisor to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, told CNBC the ban was a good start.

Full report : Most Chinese autonomous car manufacturers use United States as their testing grounds for autonomous technology and it is major risk.