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Tesla Enters “Whistleblower Hell”

129 points by AndrewBissell 7y ago

xrd 7y ago
"Pablo Escobar’s brother recently demanded $100 million in cash or Tesla shares from Musk for purportedly stealing his flamethrower idea, but the Escobars are Colombian." (Edit: sorry, didn't see the first part where it is stated that the lawsuit includes Mexican nationals. But, I still think it's crazy that this is included in an article about Tesla and whistleblowers)
- PhantomGremlin 7y ago
  It's not clear from your one word comment exactly what you're "whatting" about. Perhaps it's the silliness of the demand. Perhaps it's the "Colombian" thing at the end? If it's the Colombian bit, what you didn't quote makes clear what's happening. The lawsuit alleges links to a Mexican drug cartel. The Colombian comment at the end was to make clear that the Escobars are (allegedly) part of a different drug cartel. Here's the full paragraph: Paragraphs 16 through 19 of the lawsuit identify thefts ranging between $37 and $150 million dollars, along with links to a Mexican drug cartel. (Pablo Escobar’s brother recently demanded $100 million in cash or Tesla shares from Musk for purportedly stealing his flamethrower idea, but the Escobars are Colombian.)
lovemenot 7y ago
I have no perspective on the merits of these claims, but the approach smells a bit off. 1. Make a name as a whistleblower 2. Invite further insiders to volunteer new negative stories 3. Solicit "the right people" to fund your operation The concern here is insider trading. It's implied that funding contributors (Tesla shorts) may receive preferential access to negative news stories. Edit: insider trading is not the correct legal term. Extortion perhaps? Which law would prevent them from just coming out and saying "fund us and get the scoop on bad news for Tesla"?
vikramkr 7y ago
Tesla (or at least Elon) has a terrible habit of engaging with critics in deeply unproductive ways, such as all the anti short seller stuff they pulled. It makes them look very defensive and seem like they feel vulnerable/cant face the criticism, and maybe it's because they actually are vulnerable and doing things that merit short selling and whistleblowing. At least from a PR perspective you dont want to engage like this if you have nothing to hide, so either they're doing something wrong or they have terrible terrible PR sense. Both seem equally likely right now.
- drcross 7y ago
  Short sellers have been causing the company a lot of trouble, Musk is correct in pointing them out so that their activities become known.
  - vikramkr 7y ago
    No, they really haven't. The best way to deal with shorts is to have a good quarter and crush them all. Or wait for a short squeeze. Lots of companies have misinformation spread by shorts all the time, but very few companies engage and attack shorts.
    - kemiller 7y ago
      Tesla’s stock is shorted FAR more than any other company with comparable market cap. 30% of outstanding shares are shorted. It’s bonkers.
      - kec 7y ago
        But which is the more likely causes of this: That TSLA is the victim of an evil coordinated effort to cause the company to take, or just that 30% of the market genuinely believes they're overvalued. Given they have a higher market cap than either Ford or Honda, I'd be betting on the latter....
        7y ago
shiftpgdn 7y ago
620 lawsuits over about 10 years seems remarkably small for a company the size of Tesla. Is there an attorney who can shed light on how many lawsuits a company with a 50 billion market cap would normally receive? Anecdotally: I worked for a company with a sub hundred million dollar market cap and they had /thousands/ of open lawsuits every year.
- Waterluvian 7y ago
  What industry was the company in?
- gamblor956 7y ago
  I work for a company right in the 100 million range and they've only been sued 3 times in their entire history. It's not common for companies to get sued. 620 over Tesla's lifespan is extreme.
meritt 7y ago
https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/2-Pedestrians-Suffer-Major-Injuries-in-Crash-in-SFs-Tenderloin-513014131.html https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/2-Pedestrians-Suffer-M... Pedestrian death from a Tesla just happened this afternoon. If this is found to be AP fault instead of driver fault, guessing we'll see AP banned by Wednesday.
- pfundstein 7y ago
  That article is very light on content and details, I couldn't find any other sourced either. It would be interesting to know the circumstances around it running the red and "losing control".
  - meritt 7y ago
    I mean it just happened 2 hours ago, so pending a formal police report, I imagine details will indeed be light. Here's aftermath footage and bystander details: https://twitter.com/JennyGShao/status/1153066059802402816 https://twitter.com/JennyGShao/status/1153066059802402816 These sort of unfortunate accidents happen every day but any self-driving vehicle will be scrutinized. If the driver was in control and ran a red light, they're obviously at fault. If the AP went haywire and caused this, who is legally culpable?
    - hndamien 7y ago
      AP is driver assist, so if the pedestrian isn't at fault, then the driver is at fault. Edit: Looks horrible. I hope the cameras caught the action and can apportion blame appropriately.
      - inlined 7y ago
        Also, current AP doesn’t support stopping at lights. The best it does is blare alarms if it thinks you are going to blow one. So unless the driver has some beta software, I can’t imagine AP being blamed.
Lendal 7y ago
I never see stories about Ford's current lawsuits, or GM or Chrysler. I'm curious what goes on behind the scenes to get stories like these published and pushed out onto social media sites across the globe. Must be a pretty expansive operation because I see it every week, same stuff week in and week out. Is it true that other companies don't have disgruntled employees? I find that difficult to believe.
- camjohnson26 7y ago
  If Pablo Escobar’s brother ever threatens Ford with a lawsuit over flamethrowers I guarantee it’ll make the news. Tesla gets more coverage because Tesla has a more dramatic story.
- GuiA 7y ago
  The CEOs of those companies aren’t committing securities fraud or insulting random people on Twitter, for starters.
  - rcMgD2BwE72F 7y ago
    >aren’t committing securities fraud Please elaborate.
- grecy 7y ago
  There are trillions of dollars at stake in the auto industry that Tesla is trying to seriously disrupt. There are trillions of dollars at stake in the launch industry that SpaceX is trying to seriously disrupt. There are trillions of dollars at stake in the ride-share/taxi industry that Tesla/Elon is trying seriously to disrupt. There are a lot of people who are working very hard to paint a very negative picture of Elon/Tesla/SpaceX right now. It's amazing that stories like this make headlines while the news that the Tesla Model 3 is outselling every other electric vehicle combined doesn't make a blip. Follow the money.
  - MegaButts 7y ago
    > Follow the money And yet if you do this at the actual companies (SpaceX, Tesla) or industries (rideshare) you mention, most traditional economists will tell you they have questionable futures based on their balance sheets (all of them have been consistently losing extremely large amounts of money for years) and some believe they will actually go to zero. So by following the money, it's not hard to see why some would think these companies are overvalued.
imfromit 7y ago
Can someone explain to me (a simple European scrub) why these sorts of lawsuits seem to invariably target Elon directly? Surely they should be directed at Tesla, you know the company that employed them? Does adding Elons name to the lawsuit actually do anything in US law? Or is it merely to gain publicity by adding celebrity to a complaint?
- stonogo 7y ago
  The Sarbanes-Oxley act requires corporate leadership to take personal responsibility for the accuracy of certain company-generated reports. This lawsuit is against both Musk himself and Tesla the company.
- choppaface 7y ago
  In at least one instance, there's evidence that Musk personally instigated an effort to use a Nevada Sheriff to retaliate against a whistleblower: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19378658 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19378658
- _bxg1 7y ago
  These claims reek of personal vindictiveness, not corporate strategy. I honestly don't find it hard to believe that Elon has allowed his savior complex to become pathological, or that - like Zuckerberg and Kalanick - he's personally responsible for his company's most problematic behavior.
Tistel 7y ago
I have not been in a Tesla with Full Self Drive (FSD) and I was hoping someone here can confirm/deny my theory. The theory is that there will be this dangerous trough with the FSD feature. So at the no FSD end of the speactrum the driver is engaged mentally trying to safely get to were they want to go. At the other end of the spectrum, with fully working FSD that is better than people can drive you are are by definition safer. But! In the middle you have this dangerous middle ground. Its dangerous because the car is doing say 85% of the work, but, you need to be eagle eyed to grab the wheel and/or hit the brakes when the FSD falls into the 15% not working part. The fact that the car is doing most of the work is going to lead to people being bored and spacing out and not being ready to hit the brakes. For example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ki9RK_JDtIg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ki9RK_JDtIg. To anyone who has spent time in a FSD car, is that the case? Or is it sufficiently fear inducing that you pay super attention?
Proven 7y ago
Crooked company. Sadly, many of worst thighs they've done are perfectly legal (such as stealing many billions from US and other taxpayers - including low income people - around the world)
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
pmorais 7y ago
Disappointing that the majority of the comments here are conspiracy theories about nefarious short-sellers somehow influencing coverage (including this article) and not a single person is discussing the seriously damning allegations of 1) millions of dollars of embezzlement 2) connections to organized crime and Mexican drug cartels 3) systematic firing of those who report impropriety to upper management and 4) using law enforcement to intimidate whistleblowers Seriously this comment section of conspiratorial Tesla apologists is pathetic.
- unityByFreedom 7y ago
  I feel the same way. If I could find another tech forum where I could find topics like this and discuss them without hearing from anti-media conspiracy theorists I would join it in a heartbeat. Even just a view of HN comments without having to weed out the threads complaining about fake news would be great. I bet it's not so hard to train a classifier to identify comments that amount to "This article is paid for by short sellers". They all make the same point and never address the issues in the article.
- rcMgD2BwE72F 7y ago
  >discussing the seriously damning allegations Oh please, provide some reliable sources. So far, all the allegations -- including the ones pushed by the NYT about the company hiding unsold Model 3 inventory in the desert to cover lack of demand -- proved to be nothing.
- P_I_Staker 7y ago
  There's plenty of debunkers here as well.

129 points by AndrewBissell 7y ago

xrd 7y ago

"Pablo Escobar’s brother recently demanded $100 million in cash or Tesla shares from Musk for purportedly stealing his flamethrower idea, but the Escobars are Colombian." (Edit: sorry, didn't see the first part where it is stated that the lawsuit includes Mexican nationals. But, I still think it's crazy that this is included in an article about Tesla and whistleblowers)

PhantomGremlin 7y ago
It's not clear from your one word comment exactly what you're "whatting" about. Perhaps it's the silliness of the demand. Perhaps it's the "Colombian" thing at the end? If it's the Colombian bit, what you didn't quote makes clear what's happening. The lawsuit alleges links to a Mexican drug cartel. The Colombian comment at the end was to make clear that the Escobars are (allegedly) part of a different drug cartel. Here's the full paragraph: Paragraphs 16 through 19 of the lawsuit identify thefts ranging between $37 and $150 million dollars, along with links to a Mexican drug cartel. (Pablo Escobar’s brother recently demanded $100 million in cash or Tesla shares from Musk for purportedly stealing his flamethrower idea, but the Escobars are Colombian.)

lovemenot 7y ago

I have no perspective on the merits of these claims, but the approach smells a bit off. 1. Make a name as a whistleblower 2. Invite further insiders to volunteer new negative stories 3. Solicit "the right people" to fund your operation The concern here is insider trading. It's implied that funding contributors (Tesla shorts) may receive preferential access to negative news stories. Edit: insider trading is not the correct legal term. Extortion perhaps? Which law would prevent them from just coming out and saying "fund us and get the scoop on bad news for Tesla"?

vikramkr 7y ago

Tesla (or at least Elon) has a terrible habit of engaging with critics in deeply unproductive ways, such as all the anti short seller stuff they pulled. It makes them look very defensive and seem like they feel vulnerable/cant face the criticism, and maybe it's because they actually are vulnerable and doing things that merit short selling and whistleblowing. At least from a PR perspective you dont want to engage like this if you have nothing to hide, so either they're doing something wrong or they have terrible terrible PR sense. Both seem equally likely right now.

drcross 7y ago
Short sellers have been causing the company a lot of trouble, Musk is correct in pointing them out so that their activities become known.
- vikramkr 7y ago
  No, they really haven't. The best way to deal with shorts is to have a good quarter and crush them all. Or wait for a short squeeze. Lots of companies have misinformation spread by shorts all the time, but very few companies engage and attack shorts.
  - kemiller 7y ago
    Tesla’s stock is shorted FAR more than any other company with comparable market cap. 30% of outstanding shares are shorted. It’s bonkers.
    - kec 7y ago
      But which is the more likely causes of this: That TSLA is the victim of an evil coordinated effort to cause the company to take, or just that 30% of the market genuinely believes they're overvalued. Given they have a higher market cap than either Ford or Honda, I'd be betting on the latter....
      - 7y ago

shiftpgdn 7y ago

620 lawsuits over about 10 years seems remarkably small for a company the size of Tesla. Is there an attorney who can shed light on how many lawsuits a company with a 50 billion market cap would normally receive? Anecdotally: I worked for a company with a sub hundred million dollar market cap and they had /thousands/ of open lawsuits every year.

Waterluvian 7y ago
What industry was the company in?
gamblor956 7y ago
I work for a company right in the 100 million range and they've only been sued 3 times in their entire history. It's not common for companies to get sued. 620 over Tesla's lifespan is extreme.

meritt 7y ago

https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/2-Pedestrians-Suffer-Major-Injuries-in-Crash-in-SFs-Tenderloin-513014131.html https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/2-Pedestrians-Suffer-M... Pedestrian death from a Tesla just happened this afternoon. If this is found to be AP fault instead of driver fault, guessing we'll see AP banned by Wednesday.

pfundstein 7y ago
That article is very light on content and details, I couldn't find any other sourced either. It would be interesting to know the circumstances around it running the red and "losing control".
- meritt 7y ago
  I mean it just happened 2 hours ago, so pending a formal police report, I imagine details will indeed be light. Here's aftermath footage and bystander details: https://twitter.com/JennyGShao/status/1153066059802402816 https://twitter.com/JennyGShao/status/1153066059802402816 These sort of unfortunate accidents happen every day but any self-driving vehicle will be scrutinized. If the driver was in control and ran a red light, they're obviously at fault. If the AP went haywire and caused this, who is legally culpable?
  - hndamien 7y ago
    AP is driver assist, so if the pedestrian isn't at fault, then the driver is at fault. Edit: Looks horrible. I hope the cameras caught the action and can apportion blame appropriately.
    - inlined 7y ago
      Also, current AP doesn’t support stopping at lights. The best it does is blare alarms if it thinks you are going to blow one. So unless the driver has some beta software, I can’t imagine AP being blamed.

Lendal 7y ago

I never see stories about Ford's current lawsuits, or GM or Chrysler. I'm curious what goes on behind the scenes to get stories like these published and pushed out onto social media sites across the globe. Must be a pretty expansive operation because I see it every week, same stuff week in and week out. Is it true that other companies don't have disgruntled employees? I find that difficult to believe.

camjohnson26 7y ago
If Pablo Escobar’s brother ever threatens Ford with a lawsuit over flamethrowers I guarantee it’ll make the news. Tesla gets more coverage because Tesla has a more dramatic story.
GuiA 7y ago
The CEOs of those companies aren’t committing securities fraud or insulting random people on Twitter, for starters.
- rcMgD2BwE72F 7y ago
  >aren’t committing securities fraud Please elaborate.
grecy 7y ago
There are trillions of dollars at stake in the auto industry that Tesla is trying to seriously disrupt. There are trillions of dollars at stake in the launch industry that SpaceX is trying to seriously disrupt. There are trillions of dollars at stake in the ride-share/taxi industry that Tesla/Elon is trying seriously to disrupt. There are a lot of people who are working very hard to paint a very negative picture of Elon/Tesla/SpaceX right now. It's amazing that stories like this make headlines while the news that the Tesla Model 3 is outselling every other electric vehicle combined doesn't make a blip. Follow the money.
- MegaButts 7y ago
  > Follow the money And yet if you do this at the actual companies (SpaceX, Tesla) or industries (rideshare) you mention, most traditional economists will tell you they have questionable futures based on their balance sheets (all of them have been consistently losing extremely large amounts of money for years) and some believe they will actually go to zero. So by following the money, it's not hard to see why some would think these companies are overvalued.

imfromit 7y ago

Can someone explain to me (a simple European scrub) why these sorts of lawsuits seem to invariably target Elon directly? Surely they should be directed at Tesla, you know the company that employed them? Does adding Elons name to the lawsuit actually do anything in US law? Or is it merely to gain publicity by adding celebrity to a complaint?

stonogo 7y ago
The Sarbanes-Oxley act requires corporate leadership to take personal responsibility for the accuracy of certain company-generated reports. This lawsuit is against both Musk himself and Tesla the company.
choppaface 7y ago
In at least one instance, there's evidence that Musk personally instigated an effort to use a Nevada Sheriff to retaliate against a whistleblower: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19378658 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19378658
_bxg1 7y ago
These claims reek of personal vindictiveness, not corporate strategy. I honestly don't find it hard to believe that Elon has allowed his savior complex to become pathological, or that - like Zuckerberg and Kalanick - he's personally responsible for his company's most problematic behavior.

Tistel 7y ago

I have not been in a Tesla with Full Self Drive (FSD) and I was hoping someone here can confirm/deny my theory. The theory is that there will be this dangerous trough with the FSD feature. So at the no FSD end of the speactrum the driver is engaged mentally trying to safely get to were they want to go. At the other end of the spectrum, with fully working FSD that is better than people can drive you are are by definition safer. But! In the middle you have this dangerous middle ground. Its dangerous because the car is doing say 85% of the work, but, you need to be eagle eyed to grab the wheel and/or hit the brakes when the FSD falls into the 15% not working part. The fact that the car is doing most of the work is going to lead to people being bored and spacing out and not being ready to hit the brakes. For example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ki9RK_JDtIg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ki9RK_JDtIg. To anyone who has spent time in a FSD car, is that the case? Or is it sufficiently fear inducing that you pay super attention?

Proven 7y ago

Crooked company. Sadly, many of worst thighs they've done are perfectly legal (such as stealing many billions from US and other taxpayers - including low income people - around the world)

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

pmorais 7y ago

Disappointing that the majority of the comments here are conspiracy theories about nefarious short-sellers somehow influencing coverage (including this article) and not a single person is discussing the seriously damning allegations of 1) millions of dollars of embezzlement 2) connections to organized crime and Mexican drug cartels 3) systematic firing of those who report impropriety to upper management and 4) using law enforcement to intimidate whistleblowers Seriously this comment section of conspiratorial Tesla apologists is pathetic.

unityByFreedom 7y ago
I feel the same way. If I could find another tech forum where I could find topics like this and discuss them without hearing from anti-media conspiracy theorists I would join it in a heartbeat. Even just a view of HN comments without having to weed out the threads complaining about fake news would be great. I bet it's not so hard to train a classifier to identify comments that amount to "This article is paid for by short sellers". They all make the same point and never address the issues in the article.
rcMgD2BwE72F 7y ago
>discussing the seriously damning allegations Oh please, provide some reliable sources. So far, all the allegations -- including the ones pushed by the NYT about the company hiding unsold Model 3 inventory in the desert to cover lack of demand -- proved to be nothing.
P_I_Staker 7y ago
There's plenty of debunkers here as well.