Waymo, the autonomous ride-hailing company that launched its services in Los Angeles late last year, is recalling more than 1,200 vehicles due to a software defect, the National Highway Traffic Safety Assn. said Wednesday. The recall comes after a series of minor crashes with gates, chains and other obstacles in the road that did not result in any injuries, the Mountain View, Calif.-based company said in a filing with the NHTSA. The recall applies to 1,212 driverless vehicles operating on Waymo's fifth-generation automated driving software. Waymo released a software update to resolve the issue, and that update has already been rolled out in all affected vehicles, the recall notice said. The company operates more than 1,500 vehicles across Los Angeles, San Francisco, Phoenix and Austin.

Age: Founded in 2009 as the Google Self-Driving Car Project. How futuristic – and they've been working on this since 2009? Actually, it goes back to 2004 and a prototype autonomous car built by Stanford University. The Google project became known as Waymo in 2016. Any idea how many more years until we see the first self-driving taxis? They already have them in San Francisco, LA and Phoenix, among other places.

On April 14, Waymo will start testing its robotaxi technology outside the US for the first time. Waymo is taking it slow and will not be operating them without a driver behind the wheel yet, however. Drivers from Tokyo taxi company Nihon Kotsu Co. will be driving the cars around Chiyoda, Minato, Shinjuku and four other wards in the Japanese capital. The cameras and radars equipped on the I-PACE vehicles will collect data on Tokyo's roads, which are typically narrower than roads in the US. They'll provide the company with information on local infrastructure, road conditions and the driving patterns of locals.

Rumors circulated today that robotaxi company Waymo might use data from vehicles' interior cameras to train AI and sell targeted ads to riders. However, the company has tried to quell concerns, insisting that it won't be targeting ads to passengers. The situation arose after researcher and engineer Jane Manchun Wong discovered an unreleased version of Waymo's privacy policy that suggested the robotaxi company could start using data from its vehicles to train generative AI. The draft policy has language allowing customers to opt out of Waymo "using your personal information (including interior camera data associated with your identity) for training GAI." Wong's discovery also suggested that Waymo could use that camera footage to sell personalized ads to riders. Later in the day, The Verge obtained comments on this unreleased privacy policy from Waymo spokesperson Julia Ilina.

Waymo is continuing to expand its foothold across the US, having recently started offering paid robotaxi services in more parts of the San Francisco Bay Area. Next up are Atlanta and Miami, and now the company has revealed plans to offer its driverless Waymo One service in the nation's capital in 2026. Before that can happen, though, Waymo will need to get approval from regulators. The company says it will "continue to work closely with policymakers to formalize the regulations needed to operate without a human behind the wheel in the District." DC currently requires autonomous vehicles to have a human at the wheel, ready to take control if necessary.

Waymo is expanding to new (but actually old) territory. The Waymo One service will soon be available in more of the San Francisco Bay Area, specifically Mountain View, Los Altos, Palo Alto and parts of Sunnyvale. The company spent several years testing its self-driving cars in Mountain View, the city where its headquarters is located. According to TechCrunch, Waymo One will be available across 27 square miles of Silicon Valley, in addition to the 55 square miles it covers elsewhere in the Bay Area, including San Francisco. This is the latest in a string of expansions for the company. Waymo has been up and running in Los Angeles and Phoenix for a while.

As robotaxis become a more familiar sight on the streets of Los Angeles, Tesla has taken a step that could bring it closer to building its own fleet of self-driving electric vehicles, the California Public Utilities Commission confirmed last week. In November, Tesla applied for a permit that would allow the electric vehicle manufacturing giant to deploy transportation services with company-owned vehicles and human drivers. The permit would be required for Tesla to advance to autonomous cabs. Chief Executive Elon Musk has long made clear his ambitions for a robotaxi service powered by Tesla vehicles, though his company has been criticized by the U.S. government's highway safety agency for making statements that its vehicles can drive themselves. To be sure, the automaker is still a long way off before it can launch a service.

If you haven't seen a driverless autonomous vehicle circling your city or neighborhood block yet, that may change in the very near future. Waymo, the industry-leading robotaxi company, currently operates in Phoenix, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, and is coming to Atlanta and Austin via an Uber partnership later this year. Waymo has also made exploratory "road trips" to more than 25 other cities in a quest to become what it calls "the world's most trusted driver." Other AV companies, like Zoox and May Mobility, are on the road, too. This may leave many wondering whether a transportation revolution is underway, especially as consumers' personal vehicles gain more autonomous features, like Tesla's self-driving -- but supervision-required -- vehicles.

Some people can brush off careless, dangerous driving when they see it. I loathe it and shake my fist at the sky like Grandpa Simpson. As a pedestrian and motorist, I've been nearly struck by distracted or careless drivers more times than I can count. Recently, my jaw went slack when I watched a driver stop at a red light, then proceed through the intersection before the light turned green, all while holding -- and looking -- at their phone in their non-driving hand. It really is bad out there.