[SIGALARM]

sounds like the self-driving trucks would need to be protected by security teams, otherwise they may be susceptible to out of work pirates.

[tlb]

You can estimate the impact.

Take the fraction of truck drivers that will become pirates

Multiply by the number of trucks that an average pirate can hijack, deliver the merchandise to a reseller of stolen goods, get paid, and launder the money before getting caught.

Divide by how many shipments a truck driver currently makes per year.

And that's an estimate of the fraction of merchandise that will be pirated.

I suspect the answer is no more than 1%, in which case it is absorbable along with other kinds of lossage.

[monkmartinez]

This really needs more attention/consideration. Self-driving anything seems like a ripe target, as the perceived "harm" is to a corporation not a human driver/operator. That is, theives will not have to hurt anyone to get the goods.

[topkai22]

This seems like it has already been "solved" by trains- moving targets are hard, cargo is anonymous, stationary targets are in semi-secured railyards, and shrinkage is part of the cost of doing business.

Who wants to hijack a truck and find its full of breakfast cereal?

[monkmartinez]

I would guess that a train is much harder to stop than a truck. Further, one can drive next to a truck and have people jump on the truck to do some "snooping." The "driver" is not going to freak out/swerve as the drone truck just keeps going towards its destination at a perfectly efficient speed, perfectly centered in the lane.

[gsnedders]

In plenty of places, you can stop a train simply by cutting the signal wire (because it will fail-safe).