Just this week, the revised draft of the Road Traffic Safety Law was formally submitted for initial review at the 24th session of the Standing Committee of the 14th National People's Congress, filling a critical gap in the top-level legal framework for autonomous driving in China.
This revised draft specifically sets up an independent chapter with special provisions for autonomous vehicles, clearly defining the conceptual boundaries between autonomous vehicles and assisted driving functions at the national legal level for the first time. It also clarifies the core liability determination rules of greatest concern: if an autonomous vehicle commits a road traffic safety violation while its autonomous driving function is active, the production or import enterprise of the autonomous vehicle will directly handle the violation.
If an autonomous vehicle has not activated its autonomous driving function, or if the driver is operating a regular car equipped only with assisted driving features, such road usage scenarios will all be executed according to existing conventional management regulations for non-autonomous vehicles, with the corresponding responsible parties remaining the vehicle users and actual drivers.
In response to the groundbreaking new rules added in this draft, many industry experts involved in legislative discussions immediately interpreted the profound significance behind these adjustments.
For the autonomous driving industry to truly embark on a healthy and sustainable development path, it must legally address the issue of liability attribution that concerns all consumers most. The addition of a dedicated chapter on autonomous driving in the Road Traffic Safety Law aims to establish a unified foundational framework at the highest regulatory level for subsequent R&D, commercial implementation, and industry governance related to autonomous driving.
From the perspective of long-standing market chaos, the draft's first clear definition of the boundary between autonomous and assisted driving can prevent some automakers from exaggerating claims and evading responsibility after incidents at the root. For a long time, many automakers have been keen on over-packaging features still in the assisted driving stage as fully autonomous driving. Once an accident occurs, they immediately claim the driver is the primary responsible party, shifting all blame onto ordinary users for allegedly failing to take over control in time, making consumer rights protection often difficult.
The draft explicitly states that in true autonomous driving scenarios, the vehicle system dominates driving behavior, while in assisted driving scenarios, humans always control the vehicle. Cars equipped only with assisted driving functions are managed entirely as traditional vehicles, directly upgrading automakers' previous verbal safety promises into rigid legal obligations, essentially providing the most fundamental safeguard for public life and property safety.
Another highly groundbreaking rule design is the draft's provision that traffic violations and accidents occurring while the autonomous driving function is active will default to being borne by the production or import enterprise first; only if the enterprise can provide sufficient evidence proving that the violation is unrelated to the autonomous driving function itself can liability be apportioned differently. This shifts the burden of proof to the automakers, who are closest to the operational data, balancing rational technical judgment with human-centric care for ordinary users.
This rule design, on one hand, forces relevant operators to fully assess the true maturity of their technology, choosing business paths aligned with their capabilities under the clear distinction between autonomous and assisted driving, rather than deceiving consumers with false advertising. On the other hand, it places the primary burden of proof on companies that hold all vehicle operation data and possess absolute technical advantages, forming a reasonable constraint on the technologically dominant party and maximizing the protection of ordinary consumers' legitimate interests from a practical standpoint.
This rule adjustment also directly corrects widespread misconceptions among the public. Currently, the vast majority of mass-produced cars in the domestic market are equipped only with Level 2 assisted driving functions, requiring drivers to keep their hands on the steering wheel and monitor all road conditions at all times, bearing full responsibility for all driving-related matters.
Previously, a core cause of many accidents involving driver-assistance systems was that ordinary consumers were misled by excessive marketing from automakers, mistaking driver assistance for autonomous driving and taking their hands off the wheel, ultimately leading to tragedies that could have been avoided. With this legal clarification, a clear cognitive red line has been drawn for all consumers.