App outage leaves Tesla owners stranded, unable to start their vehicles

[bj33813]

Tesla software failure reminds customers not to rely solely on the mobile app

https://www.techspot.com/news/92317-app-outage-leaves-tesla-owners-stranded-unable-start.html

Tesla not impervious either?

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[daveo4EV]

no one is impervioius - my experience is that all vendors suck at one time or another…many on this forum have had less than stellar experiences with their Taycan - and yes Tesla also occassionally sucks…

 

[Jhenson29]

Sounds like users would be fine if they reverted back to a physical key or card.

Doesn’t sound that bad really. I guess people just don’t take those things with them? Get comfortable with the app working? Kind of on the user IMO.

 

[daveo4EV]

a few things:

• when I owned my Model 3 performance between 2018 and 2020 I know for a fact I could unlock/start the vehicle with my phone deep in a parking garage with _NO_ cell coverage or internet
  • I did this daily - as my companies parking garage has NO coverage if you get to work late and have to park deeper into the lower levels of the parking garage.
  • so it’s interesting to me there now appears to be a server dependency - I‘m wondering if this is “by design” or it crept in via other software changes and was un-intentional
• I always carried the RFID key card with me because it’s the only way to “turn the keys” over to someone else (parking valet for example) - since you’re not going to give them your phone…
• I had to use my RFID card occasionally when my phone was dead
• I preferred the RFID card to Porsche’s bulky FOB’s since it is thin/light/easy to carry and has no “volume” in my pocket/wallet

I love the phone “as a key“ feature and concept - but for me personally I have to gives the keys to someone else more often than most people think - and therefore a physical key/fob/rfid card that isn’t your personal phone is a requirement.

I’m going to guess this is an unintentional dependency that crept in over time and that they will fix it - and update their QA process to test for this specific condition to avoid regressions in the future - but I know for a fact this used to work with zero internet/cell coverage:

• parking structures underground with no coverage - yep my Model 3 worked with my phone no issue
• middle of no where places with no coverage (some of the mountain roads with no coverage) south from Tahoe - Model 3 worked with my phone no coverage…

I’m wondering if the problem is more subtle - perhaps it would’ve worked if there was no coverage, but there _IS_ a server required when there is a network connection, but they never tested/dealt with the server being reachable but non-functional

I’ve seen bugs like this before with networking - things work great when there is functional network and server, and things work great where there is _NO_ network, but where there is a functional network (i.e. you’re online and other things are working) but you can’t reach YOUR server or it’s erroring no one deals with failure in that case…

none the less this is an unfortunate problem, it sucks, it shouldn’ be this way, it doesn’t have to be this way, but it’s software so I’m guessing it got fixed, and will get improved in the future.

anyone who was stranded by this could’ve resolved the issue with the RFID card, but most people don’t plan…

for example I’m willing to guess most porsche owners don’t realize there is a physical key inside the FOB to deal with similiar issues with their Porsche (not server outages, but far more common 12V dead battery issues for example) - but a call to Porsche service and they would be “educated” as to the physical key…

 

[daveo4EV]

also note there are two ways to “use your phone” to unlock/start your Tesla Model 3/Y

1. Tesla’s app has this functionality - you can both unlock/lock and start your Tesla from the Tesla app
   1. this method REQUIRES the Tesla server‘s to be functional and reachable - this has always required a server and internet connection and will most likley always be this way - it’s the design of the feature.
   2. this method requires you to actively “use” your phone and launch the app and tap buttons on screen to accomplish unlock/lock & start
   3. it’s actually quite a bit of work and not easy IMHO but it works (if the servers are reachable).
2. You can “pair” your phone with your Tesla and simple passive proximity of the phone to the vehicle allows both unlock and start functionality simliar to any standard vehicle FOB
   1. this method is “passive” and only requires you to have your phone “alive” and in proximity to the vehicle (like a fob)
      1. won’t work if your phone is “off”
      2. won’t work if youre phone is powered on but has NEVER been unlocked
      3. won’t work if your phone is in airplane mode (ask me how I know - LOL)
      4. will work if your phone is “locked” and “dark” but alive and in your pocket - it is fully passive just like a FOB.
   2. on iOS it requires the phone to be “unlocked” in that you must have unlocked your phone “at least” once after a full power restart or reboot - the ”passive” unlock feature requires the iOS device to have been unlocked at least once post restart to have access to the necessary security information and is a standard security feature of iOS (after a reboot iOS has much much user data encrypted and unavailable to apps until after the “1st” unlock)
   3. many many many Tesla owners that I’ve encountered are unaware of this feature and/or have not set it up - opting instead for #1 being “good enough” why bother?

it turns out method #2 requires a one time additional setup step - and I’ve run into a number of Tesla owners that are UNAWARE and have NEVER setup method #2 - they just assumed that using their phone meant method #1 - this pariing method is about the same complexity as settingup home link - i.e. not as easy as it could be but doable - it DOES require you to enter your Tesla account password into the vehicle and type some numbers into the phone - i.e. it’s a standard “secure” pairing process and requires mutual verification at time of “paring” for security - I can see many people opting to skip this step - just like many people find homelink setup to be too tedious to accomplish…

I wonder how many people that were experiencing the inability to “unlock” start their Tesla’s were using method’s #1 vs. #2…

historically my experience with #2 until july of 2020 no internet/server was required
method #1 has _ALWAYS_ required a server and active internet connection and was never point to point with the vehicle - it was always done via the cloud.

I know for a fact many many Tesla customers use only method #1 due to: laziness, lack of awareness, just haven’t gotten around to “paring” the phone with the car for the “passive” unlock/start features…if you are not using method #2 then a server outage WOULD cause you to lose access to your vehicle

if this report relates to method #2 not working due to a server outage this would mean the implementation has changed since my personal experience ended in July of 2020 with the delivery of my Taycan.

 

[daveo4EV]

it’s also interesting Apple’s “phone as a key” featrue which to date only BMW has adopted I believe, aspires to “FOB” like passiveness - in that it is using modern NFC wireless communcation and _CAN_ work even when the phone is offline/locked/or even battery dead (as the NFC chip has some mild power reserves and can operated even if the main phone CPU lacks battery power)…

 

[im85288]

I’m one of those lazy Tesla owners that utilities the second option you mentioned above. When I first got the car for the first couple of weeks I carried round the key card but in over 2 years ownership have not had the need to use it once I had set up my phone as a key. Nothing is simpler than walking up to the car with phone in pocket, doors unlock..put into drive and away you go. Get to your destination, phone into your pocket..walk away, doors lock automatically.

 

[chenner]

I experienced this "server error" message on Friday. It didn't stop my car from charging, unlocking or me driving it and I was 200 miles from home.

So it's being blown out of proportion.

 

[fullmetalbaal]

It's mostly a hit piece. They have had an outage like this before about 1 year ago.
If you properly linked your phone, it's a non-issue. You also always have the physical card (Model 3 and Y) or a key fob (Model S and X). I think the people most impacted are non-Tesla owners looking for a topic to get excited about.

The media is making a bigger deal about this than they made about Chevrolet Bolt owners not being allowed to park their Bolts in parking garages due to excessive fire risk..

 

[chrisk]

it’s also interesting Apple’s “phone as a key” featrue which to date only BMW has adopted I believe, aspires to “FOB” like passiveness - in that it is using modern NFC wireless communcation and _CAN_ work even when the phone is offline/locked/or even battery dead (as the NFC chip has some mild power reserves and can operated even if the main phone CPU lacks battery power)…

NFC would require you to pull the phone out of your pocket and put it next to the car.
Ford Mach-e uses phone as a key. I think it uses Bluetooth and it works with both iphones and Androids. In theory it connects to the car as you walk towards it.
Moreover the Ford has a numeric keypad hidden on driver's door B pillar that you can use to unlock the car and a pincode you can type on the infotainment screen to start the car. The pincode is the backup if your phone as a key fails for any reason.

Disclaimer: I personally use the physical key fob because I have seen a few reports from folks having some issues with phone as a key. It is mostly early owners and most bugs are fixed by Ford now.
I also have forgotten the pincode I set 6 weeks ago ?

 

[whitex]

What @fullmetalbaal said - overhyped media headline. Yes the servers were out, yes that means you could not unlock or start the car if you were using the app via the server, BUT that is not the primary method of unlocking/starting the car for any Tesla. S/X has a fob. 3/Y have phone as key which uses bluetooth - both work without any internet connectivity. If you are an owner who relies solely on the app via server to start you car, you expose yourself to many failure points - your phone, your cell phone coverage, your phone service provider and their ISP (yes, those have outages too, like recent AT&T one), Tesla servers, backbone ISP to which Tesla servers are connected (even backbone ISP's have also had some outages and/or routing screwups this past year).

Tesla has had app outages before, heck they even had a couple of days with mothership servers out so all Teslas lost their map navigation on the big screen for up to a couple of days (but there was built-in navigation on your IC which still worked).

Full disclosure, I've been driving Teslas exclusively since 2013, but I am not a Tesla fanboy, I don't make excuses for Elon or Tesla, This story however is nothing to write home about. I might even say those 500 owners who claim they couldn't get into their cars, are a bigger story - this is why you don't trust the cloud as the sole method of accomplishing something crucial in your everyday life. That is why everything I buy, must continue to work, be it with sans cloud enabled capabilities, even if the world internet crashed (or a more realistic scenario for me, the service provider of the cloud service went bankrupt or chose to discontinue the services because they decided they are not making enough recurring money from it, or to force people to upgrade to new cloud connected devices).

 

[Bognar67]

Totally FAKE.
I (and everybody) could open/close/use the car via phone access as before, phone connection for these basic things via bluetooth. We could not remote control the car for couple of hours that is all.

 

[Toodal00]

my app didnt work to see its location, but it did work unlocking the car and allowing me to drive it. fake news media loves running these click bait stories

 

[XLR82XS]

Makes me miss yesteryear sometimes..... good old metal key in tumbler! It felt so cool to upgrade to a remote keyless entry system.

 

[whitex]

Totally FAKE.
I (and everybody) could open/close/use the car via phone access as before, phone connection for these basic things via bluetooth. We could not remote control the car for couple of hours that is all.

I think you meant to say everybody you know, not everybody in the USA. I suspect you drive a Model 3 or Model Y. While you might not know any of the other owners, Tesla does have other model cars, which do not have app Bluetooth functionality.

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