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
Tesla Cybercab is set to launch in Austin, Texas, on September 3, as the company has officially started sending out invitations to a dedicated event it will hold in the city where its headquarters is located.
The Cybercab is Tesla’s dedicated ride-sharing vehicle: it features just two seats and has no steering wheel or pedals. It is aimed at fully autonomous passenger transport, and will operate in the Robotaxi fleet alongside the Tesla Model Y, which has been performing driverless rides for real-world passengers for more than a year.
Thank you so much @Tesla for inviting us to the Cybercab launch in Austin! 🤠 pic.twitter.com/F1rAR8zd5O
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) August 22, 2026
The launch of the Cybercab marks the next chapter in Tesla’s autonomy story. The company has been developing autonomous transport for years with its Full Self-Driving (Supervised) platform, which is available in any vehicle the company has built with the proper hardware and software capabilities.
Its capabilities vary by hardware and software version, but Tesla says its latest hardware version, known as AI4, can deliver full autonomy. However, future vehicles will operate with even more robust hardware packages, as Tesla will develop AI4.5 and AI5 for even more capability in its vehicles.
Following a report from The Information that surfaced earlier this week, the writing was on the wall that Tesla was set to launch Cybercab in the near term. The report stated Tesla could launch Cybercab as soon as the end of August. Tesla came close and has booked it for September 3.
The big thing with this event being scheduled is not necessarily that Tesla is launching a new vehicle, but instead that it is launching a vehicle that has no steering wheel or pedals and will operate exclusively on a self-driving program that is evidently nearing full autonomy. If the event allows vehicles to take passengers on public roads and drop them off wherever they please within the City of Austin, it will be a drastic advancement in the company’s self-driving story.
People have ridden in Cybercab previously: Tesla had the “We, Robot” event in October 2024, which allowed people to experience fully autonomous rides in a closed circuit at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank.
🚨 Ride in a Tesla Cybercab with us
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) May 11, 2025
Additionally, Tesla launched employee rides in Cybercab in July.
It’s a drastic step forward for Tesla, whose CEO, Elon Musk, has promised for years that the company would release a fully autonomous vehicle and platform capable of allowing drivers to relinquish any responsibility behind the wheel.
Elon Musk put a number on where he thinks SpaceX’s Starship program is headed by 2030, replying on X a day after President Trump signed a memo pushing the country toward 1,000 space launches and reentries a year.
The exchange started when Aaron Burnett, co-founder of propulsion startup Mach 33, posted that “1,000 launches/reentries is the goal,” quoting White House science adviser Michael Kratsios on the newly signed National Space Transportation Policy. Burnett noted that the FAA’s own bull-case forecast reached only 385 annual launches by 2030, while his firm’s conservative model already put SpaceX alone near 940. Musk responded, “We’re aiming to reach 30+ Starship launches/day in 2030, which is ~10k annualized. Still tiny numbers compared to airplane flights!”
We’re aiming to reach 30+ Starship launches/day in 2030, which is ~10k annualized.
Still tiny numbers compared to airplane flights!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 21, 2026
That figure is specific to Starship, the rocket SpaceX is still developing for orbital and lunar missions, not the Falcon 9 fleet that carries most of the company’s current launch volume. Starship has flown twice this year, a slower pace than the four and five flights SpaceX managed in 2024 and 2025. Getting from two flights a year to 30 a day is the scale of jump the new federal policy is meant to clear regulatory room for.
Trump’s memo, signed Thursday, directs agencies to identify new launch and reentry sites on federal land, including a new reentry site within 90 days, and to speed up the permitting and environmental reviews that have long slowed cadence growth. It also sets a goal of returning American astronauts to the moon by 2028 and placing initial lunar base elements by 2030, tying the launch buildout directly to NASA’s Artemis program.
SpaceX has already been pushing the FAA toward higher numbers on its own. The agency approved up to 44 annual Starship launches from Kennedy Space Center in February, on top of a 2024 review that raised the cap at Starbase in Texas to 25 a year. Those approvals cover a fraction of the 10,000 annual flights Musk is now describing, which shows how far current permitting still sits from the administration’s stated target.
The near-term test of all this is more modest. SpaceX cleared a full-duration, six-engine static fire on its next Starship vehicle this week, the last major hardware checkpoint before Flight 14, which is targeting no earlier than August 28 and is expected to attempt the vehicle’s first full orbital mission. Musk said last week that a tower catch of the upper stage is still probably months away, a reminder that the immediate roadmap remains far more incremental than the daily launch numbers he just posted.
Tesla will resolve its massive recall of nearly three million vehicles in China with stickers and a software update.
On Friday, Chinese regulators filed recall plans against Tesla, Xiaomi, Leapmotor, Xpeng, Chery, Geely, Dongfeng, Arcfox, and FAW to resolve what is essentially a carbon-copy issue throughout each of the companies’ vehicle models: emergency door release latches are simply not visible enough.
Tesla door handle saga gets its latest chapter and a big change is coming
The companies will be required to add things that will make these latches, which will open the door in the event of an emergency, more visible. Of the 7 million vehicles impacted, Tesla accounts for 2,975,910 units. More than 1.9 million of those are Model Y vehicles, with the rest, just over 970,000, being Model 3s.
To resolve the issue, Tesla is going to add warning labels to the emergency latches free of charge, and then utilize an Over-the-Air update to add a post-crash window-lowering strategy, according to CNEVpost.
This massive effort to fix the all-electric Model Y and Model 3’s emergency latch system comes just months after several probes across various markets identified the trouble some had identifying this latch. Those who had gotten involved in car accidents that stripped the vehicle of its power were not aware that every Tesla has emergency door latches.
China’s State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) said that severe crashes that disable a vehicle’s low-voltage system could not only hinder occupants from getting out, but also make it more difficult for emergency response workers to gain entry.
SAMR is starting to tighten the regulations it has on door handles on vehicles. A new mandatory national standard will take effect for all models starting January 1, 2027, and will require all doors to be equipped with mechanical release mechanisms. This will effectively end purely electronic door handles. Models already on sale with type approval have been granted a two-year transition period, which will enable things to change until January 2029.
Tesla will launch Cybercab on September 3
SpaceX and a new Trump order that could rewrite the next decade of launches
