Officials in San Francisco have asked for a halt to the expansion of driverless car tests across the city after a series of incidents that have hampered the work of emergency services. San Francisco's position at the heart of Silicon Valley and its wealth of technology talent has made it a hotbed for the driverless car industry. Both Waymo, owned by Google's parent company Alphabet, and Cruise, owned by General Motors, operate experimental robotic taxi services in the city. But they haven't been without problems. New Scientist has previously reported how autonomous vehicles (AV) from Cruise, for example, have randomly stopped and blocked traffic and had a run-in with police.

Self-driving startup Aurora is the first company to receive Pennsylvania's blessing to test autonomous vehicles on its roads. As TechCrunch noted, it's actually been trialing its technology on the streets of Pittsburgh since 2017 -- along with other companies -- but the state only released its automated vehicle testing guidance in July. While automakers aren't required to register, Aurora voluntarily complied with the government's request, which will give the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation access to information about its test results and conditions, the safety measures it takes, the vetting and training of its vehicle operators and the internal details about how its self-driving system works. Aurora is nowhere near as recognizable as Waymo, but it was founded by three experienced names in the field: Chris Urmson (led Carnegie Mellon's self-driving efforts in DARPA's Grand Challenges), Drew Bagnell (formerly of Uber's self-driving team) and Sterling Anderson (from Tesla's Autopilot team). In fact, the startup's beginnings were mired in controversy.

Expect to see driverless cars roaming around the Buckeye State in the near future. Ohio Governor John Kasich has issued an executive order permitting self-driving car tests on public roads, adding to a small but growing list of autonomous-friendly states that includes Arizona, California and Michigan. There are conditions, of course, although they're not extremely strict at first glance. Every vehicle will need a human operator from the company performing the tests and reporting any accidents. Every hopeful firm will also have to register with DriveOhio, a central hub for mobility initiatives (conveniently established by Kasich in January) that will collect information on both the cars and their testing locations.

As the investigation into last week's fatal crash where an autonomous Uber SUV struck and killed a pedestrian in Tempe, AZ, the state's governor has suspended Uber's permission to test its cars there. While the company had already halted testing nationwide after the test, this is a turnaround after Gov. Doug Ducey (R) had welcomed self-driving testing from many companies with open arms in a relationship that stretches back a few years. Just a few weeks ago Ducey updated his autonomous vehicle executive order to allow testing without a safety driver. In this crash, there was a test driver behind the wheel, but neither they nor the car reacted in time to avoid a woman who crossed in front of the car. In a letter to Uber, the Wall Street Journal reports Ducey said "my expectation is that public safety is also the top priority for all who operate this technology in the state of Arizona..The incident that took place on March 18 is an unquestionable failure to comply with this expectation."

Sunday evening, one of Uber's autonomous SUVs struck a woman who later died at the hospital as a result of her injuries. It appears to be the first time a pedestrian has died after a collision with an autonomous vehicle, and as a result, Uber has temporarily suspended all its testing. While an investigation is ongoing, the Tempe police chief provided an update based on video from the car itself, and said "it's very clear it would have been difficult to avoid this collision in any kind of mode (autonomous or human-driven) based on how she came from the shadows right into the roadway." Still, if there's a chance for widespread adoption of self-driving car technology, the amount of transparency Uber displays right now will be important. The idea of a data-science company no one has ever heard of attempting to poke around in a country's collective psyche sounds like a plot out of Black Mirror, and yet here we are.

Uber is putting all of its self-driving vehicle tests on hold after one of its cars struck and killed a pedestrian in Tempe, Arizona Sunday evening. According to ABC affiliate KNXV, the car had a human operator behind the wheel but was in autonomous mode. A woman walking on a crosswalk was struck by the car and she later died in the hospital due to the injuries she sustained. Uber says that it is working with the the local authorities.

Uber is temporarily halting self-driving car tests in all locations after a deadly accident, in what is likely the first pedestrian fatality caused by a self-driving car. Programs in San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Phoenix and Toronto will be paused after a woman was hit and killed overnight by an Uber self-driving car when walking across a street in Tempe, Arizona. A spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board told CNBC it is investigating the accident. There was a vehicle operator in the car but no passengers at the time of the accident, according to Tempe police, which responded to the scene at around 10 p.m. on Sunday. The 49-year-old victim passed away after being transported to a local hospital, police said.

Uber has said it is suspending self-driving car tests in all US cities after a fatal accident. A woman was hit by a car and killed as she crossed the street in Tempe, Arizona. Uber said it was cooperating with local authorities in Arizona following the crash. The death comes a year after Uber took its self-driving cars off the road following an accident that left a Volvo SUV on its side in Arizona. Uber chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi said the death was "incredibly sad news".

China is opening up its roads to self-driving cars. The Beijing Municipal Transport Commission released a statement today saying that on certain roads and under certain conditions, companies registered in China will be able to test their autonomous vehicles. Last year, Chinese authorities banned self-driving vehicles from the country's highways until new regulations could be created and approved. But those have been slow to arrive, which is why Chinese company Baidu and its CEO Robin Li came under fire this summer for conducting an apparently illegal demonstration of its driverless technology. The new regulations will allow companies to apply for temporary permission to test their autonomous vehicles on a yet-to-be-determined group of approved roads.

The combination is the latest between technology and automotive companies after Daimler, which owns Mercedes-Benz, last month unveiled an autonomous cars development partnership with supplier Robert Bosch, while BMW has announced an alliance with chip maker Intel and Israel's Mobileye.