Brandon Dalaly, a Tesla owner, has a unique way of unlocking his car: with his hand. Or rather, with the specially made chip that was implanted in his hand eleven days ago. I spoke with him about his new implant and he told me that this was actually his second one.
The first thing I wanted to know was how bad it hurt. If you watch this video, you’ll probably wince in imaginary pain as I did. Brandon explained that this was his second chip. When he received his first one, he did not use any anesthesia or anything to numb it.
“The first one was a little bit smaller so it wasn’t as intense as shoving that giant rod into my hand. The first one came preloaded into a larger syringe. They pushed the syringe in and they popped in the chip similar to how they would microchip a dog.”
The first chip implant burned and was sore for about a month. However, for the second one which is what is used to unlock his Tesla, his hand was anesthetized with lidocaine. Brandon said a four-gauge needle was used.
The chips, he explained, are coated in biocompatible substances such as biopolymer. His other one is a bioglass. Once implanted, the body encapsulates the chip with its own tissue.
Why Two Chips?
I was curious as to why Brandon had two chip implants. He explained that they do completely different things. The chips are used for a variety of purposes such as access control, storing data, lighting up under your skin, or storing cryptocurrencies. Brandon is actually beta testing the chip he uses to unlock his Tesla.
The chip that Brandon uses to unlock his Tesla is the VivoKey Apex which is a contactless NFC secure element chip.
“I’m in a beta group of around 100 people and this one can do secure transactions and java card applets. The company that put this together literally has its own app store where you can wirelessly install apps into your body with these chips. And one of the apps just happened to be a Tesla key card. So that was the first app I installed on it because I have a Tesla and now I use that as my key when my Bluetooth key fails or I don’t have my key card. You just use your hand.”
The first chip, Brandon explained, is the key to his home and stores his portfolio, his contact card, medical information, Covid vaccination card, and similar items. The chip can be scanned with any cell phone which then opens a portal you can access the information.
“The whole idea was that I would have my house key in my left hand and my car key in my right hand. And then what’s really cool is when it’s approved, they can wirelessly activate the new chip I just got to do credit card transactions. I can link a credit card to it and I can use it anywhere where there are tap-to-pay terminals.”
The Obvious Concern: accidently being close to something that would scan the chip and use it.
One concern I had was what if the chip was accidently used or accessed. Or, worst case scenario, hacked? For example, would a nearby credit card machine accidently scan your chip and access your money? Brandon explained that the chip had to be very close for the machine to read it.
“You have to be within a few millimeters of the thing and realistically, hopefully, you’re not just walking through credit card terminals and brushing your hands against them during mid transactions.”
“It’s a very short read range. It’s no different from your phone if you use Apple Pay. It’s like that but it’s built in your hand.”
Will Brandon get more chips?
Could this be the tech version of tattoo addictions? I asked Brandon if he had plans for getting any more chips in the future. Brandon works in tech and `is always trying to be on the cutting edge of everything.
“For me, it’s something that made sense at the time. It’s kind of like a fun party trick. When you can one of my chips with your phone, it glows green underneath your skin.”
There is another chip but it’s not yet available in the U.S. just yet. This one measures your body temperature. The capsule is installed in your chest and you can scan it with your phone and take your temperature.
“We’re at the dawn of this technology and it’s a very niche product. And there’s been a lot of pushback. People thought that Bill Gates was putting tracking chips in the Covid vaccine. It fuels a lot of conspiracy theories.”
“It’s funny because these chips can’t track anything. You would need an external power supply to be tracked anywhere. And their phones are tracking them everywhere they go anyway. If you go to your Google location history, it shows you step-by-step where you’ve been.”
“And there’s the religious people who have sent me a bunch of weird comments on Facebook about the mark of the beast on the video of my first chip installation. There’s something in the Book of Revelation that talks about this mark in your hand or forehead that shows your allegiance to Satan or something like that. I just don’t want to have to worry about forgetting my car keys. I’m not over here worshiping Satan.”
Cost of getting the Tesla key card chip implanted.
Credit: Brandon Dalaly
If you were to guess how much this would cost, you might be shocked at how wrong you may be. Unless you guessed $400.
“It’s not as bad as people think. Since I was a beta tester, I got the chip for $300 and then my installer charged me just $100 to put it in. To him, it was the same as a subdermal piercing. It’s the same method but he was sticking in something different.”
Brandon’s installer has been a professional piercer for over 15 years. What do you think? Would you consider having a chip installed in your hand to unlock your Tesla or smart car?
Disclaimer: Johnna is long Tesla.
Your feedback is important. If you have any comments, concerns, or see a typo, you can email me at johnna@teslarati.com. You can also reach me on Twitter @JohnnaCrider1
News
Tesla makes good on its Cybercab promise in just two weeks
Tesla Cybercab riders can now pull up a rear camera view and darken the screen.
Tesla has given Cybercab passengers a way to see what is behind them, along with a way to turn the cabin screen off entirely.
Riders in Austin can now bring up a live rearview camera feed on the Cybercab’s center display in the middle of a trip. Austin rider Ethan McKanna spotted the change late Friday night, posting from a ride that “You can now open the camera to view what’s behind you in Cybercab!” His photo shows a strip of rear camera video across the top of the screen, with another Cybercab following on a bridge. Sawyer Merritt shared the image Saturday and wrote that it “sounds like” there is also a new quiet mode that darkens the entire screen for riders who want to relax, sleep, or avoid a bright display at night.
The camera view goes beyond the rear feed. Tesla UI software engineer Evan, who posts as @CarCoder, replied to McKanna with a tip: “You can also tap it to see more cameras, and swipe it up or down to hide and show.” Until now, the Cybercab only showed its rear and repeater feeds on the “Please Exit Safely” screen at the end of a ride, so passengers could check for cyclists and traffic before opening a door.
Quiet mode surfaced a day earlier. Austin rider Jackson Blatz posted a video Friday morning of the new Robotaxi interface in a Cybercab with the option. Tesla has not published release notes for either feature.
The rear camera view moved quickly from request to release. Earlier this month, Cybercab rider Dan Burkland asked Tesla to let passengers pull up the rear and repeater cameras whenever they want, “especially for peace of mind.” Evan answered “In development,” as Teslarati reported at the time. About two weeks later, riders have it.
The feature fills a gap created by the Cybercab’s design. With no steering wheel, no pedals, no mirrors and no rear window, a passenger has no natural way to glance behind the car. The eight exterior cameras that feed Tesla’s autonomy software were already on board, so the change only required software.
There is also an AI angle to how it was built. Yun-Ta Tsai, a senior staff engineer on Tesla’s AI team, quoted Merritt’s post and wrote that the “(human) camera view tuning is optimized with Grok and implements part of the algorithm by directly programming the fixed-function hardware, so I don’t even need to check the datasheet.” Tsai did not say which part of the algorithm Grok handled. Grok already plays a bigger role inside the vehicle, with Grok Bot now enabled across every Cybercab and the Model Y Robotaxi fleet after Tesla brought the agent into its cars in September.
The two features join a busy week of changes for riders in Austin, which also brought a redesigned Live Activity for iPhone and Apple Watch and live trip sharing. They also arrive as Tesla prepares the Cybercab for life outside its own fleet. On the third quarter earnings call, Lars Moravy said the company is aiming to deliver Cybercabs to customers before the end of 2026. Tesla has not said whether the camera view and quiet mode will also come to its Model Y Robotaxis.
Elon Musk
Tesla shows what Roadster drivers will see on screen before thruster activation
Tesla’s Roadster video reveals a fighter jet inspired cockpit with a 5,500 PSI thruster gauge.
Tesla has given future owners their clearest look yet at the cockpit of its next generation Roadster. In a 34 second video posted to X on Friday afternoon, the company walked through the car’s touchscreen with a caption: “Inspired by fighter jet cockpits, Roadster’s interface was designed around the pilot.”
The clip opens on a black screen with red graphics and a 3D wireframe of the car, which sits beside the Roadster’s squared off yoke. Tapping parts of the model brings up controls for the rear wing, including low drag and high downforce positions, along with a charging page with a charge limit bar and a small music player. A row of tabs along the bottom reads Home, Vehicle, Listen, Climate and Navigate.
Most of the video is spent in Track Mode. The dashboard shows a live circuit map, a list of session lap times, brake and motor temperatures, and pressure and temperature readouts for each tire. A setup page lets the driver pick Auto, Low Drag, High Downforce or Custom aero modes, adjust aero balance and brake balance, and switch stability and traction control off. Along the bottom, a status bar reads “Thruster · 5,500 PSI” next to a “Boost Ready” indicator.
That gauge ties the software to the hardware Tesla showed off near Waco, Texas on October 15. The Thrust and Rocket versions use cold gas thrusters fed by carbon overwrapped pressure vessels, and Tesla lists 0 to 60 mph times of under 0.9 seconds and under 0.59 seconds for them, as Teslarati detailed in its breakdown of the three Roadster configurations. The base Performance car relies on a fan and ground sealing system for grip, and the aero settings on screen match the active wings and suction setup covered in our look at how the Roadster generates downforce.
The Roadster layout is a departure from the rest of Tesla’s lineup. Instead of a map centered screen, the Roadster puts the car itself at the center of the home page, and Tesla’s Roadster page lists two smaller forward displays alongside the main touchscreen. Tesla has not said whether any of the Track Mode telemetry will make its way to the Model 3 Performance or other vehicles.
The interface could still change before deliveries. Elon Musk said at the event that Roadster production will begin in 2028, and Tesla says the flagship Rocket version is not approved for public road use. Reservations are open with a $50,000 payment, while Thrust is listed as a limited release and Rocket is invite only.
Those who want to see the car in person will get their first chance this weekend. The Roadster goes on display in the lobby of the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles from October 24 to 27, according to Sawyer Merritt, the first time the public will be able to view it up close.
Elon Musk
Tesla reveals Optimus Academy, where robots teach themselves
Tesla has begun building production quality Optimus robots in Fremont and revealed its training plan.
Tesla has started building Optimus on the high volume line it set up inside its Fremont factory, and the company says the robots coming off it are the first that meet the bar for a real product. “The bots coming off this line are the first production-quality bots that we have manufactured,” Tesla wrote in its third quarter shareholder letter, adding that it has “proven that the current manufacturing process for Optimus is suitable for a commercial product.”
The line sits in space that built the Model S and Model X until this spring. Tesla cleared the old vehicle line in 46 days, as Teslarati reported in July, to make room for robot production sized for one million units a year. On Wednesday’s earnings call, Elon Musk said most of the equipment for that capacity is already in Fremont, with output set to climb toward roughly 20,000 robots a week as the line ramps.
Musk described the ramp as a classic S curve. “The growth of Optimus is an S curve, but the initial curve is a shallow slope,” he said. The team is now refining the robot’s AI, electromechanical design, reliability and service life, and Musk expects that work to be finished by the end of next year, when Tesla plans to start delivering Optimus to outside companies for dangerous, repetitive and around the clock jobs.
The most interesting part of the call was how Tesla plans to teach the robots. Its cars send real driving data back to the AI team from millions of vehicles, but Optimus has no fleet like that yet. “A big difference with Optimus versus the cars is we don’t have this vast fleet of cars from which we can gather training data,” Musk said. Tesla’s answer is an Optimus Academy, where 10,000 to 20,000 robots will practice a wide range of tasks and feed what they learn into the next version of the model. Every unit off the Fremont line becomes a source of that training data.
Smarter hardware is on the way too. Tesla plans to put its AI5 chip into Optimus next year, and Musk said a new Optimus video should arrive within one or two months showing the robot completing tasks driven by AI rather than preprogrammed motions. He took aim at rival humanoid demos that only run scripted routines, saying those would not hold up in the real world.
The supply chain is lining up behind the program. In September, Tesla certified Tuopu, Joyson and Sanhua as mass production partners for Optimus components. A far larger Optimus factory is also rising at Giga Texas, where drone footage from Joe Tegtmeyer showed the steel frame nearing completion, and Musk has pegged that plant’s long term target at 10 million robots a year.
Tesla executives also said Optimus production costs are trending toward the expected manufacturing cost of Cybercab, a sign the robot is being engineered for volume from the start. The hands remain the toughest piece of the design, a point Musk also made at the X Takeover event earlier this month, as Teslarati covered at the time, and that is where much of the current engineering effort is focused.
Tesla makes good on its Cybercab promise in just two weeks
Tesla shows what Roadster drivers will see on screen before thruster activation
