Woman Gets In A Waymo—Then The Car Starts Interrogating Her: 'I Look Too Young'

Getting carded at a bar is one thing. It can be flattering to have your age questioned. It can also be annoying to have to prove you’re over 21 when you’re clearly of legal drinking age.

But getting carded (basically) by your driverless smart car taxi is a whole different experience that begs the question: How much are we being surveilled?

What Happened In The Waymo?

In a TikTok with more than 1.8 million views, content creator Addi (@ihaveahottake) documents a moment that's becoming increasingly common for Waymo riders.

"My Waymo just said I look too young to be riding by myself,” the text overlay reads.

In the video the Waymo, or rather what sounds to be a human Waymo representative tapped into the car’s speaker system, asks,  "Are you over the age of 18?" in the middle of the ride.

When Addi confirms she is (she didn’t have to show ID, it seems), the rep asks a follow up: “Are you the account holder?” 

Once Addi confirms, the rep thanks her and sends her on her way.

“Shoutout Sculptra,” Addi adds in the caption, referring to an injectable used to make the face look younger.

Why Is Waymo Carding People?

This isn't a one-off situation. According to Waymo's guidelines, riders must be 18 or older to use the app and ride alone, with one exception: in the Phoenix area, minors aged 14–17 can ride with a parent-linked teen account.

To enforce that, Waymo has been rolling out mid-ride age verification checks, and plenty of adult riders have been caught off guard by them. As AOL News reported, the checks have become something of a running joke among riders, with some treating them as accidental compliments. 

Seema Amble, a partner at Andreessen Horowitz, posted on X after being asked to confirm her age mid-ride, "Is this the new version of getting carded? Should I be flattered?" Another rider joked that she should share her skincare routine after Waymo flagged her as potentially underage.

Waymo has acknowledged the situation. A spokesperson told AOL News the company has "policies in place to help us identify violations of our terms of service, including age eligibility," and that it's continuing to refine the system.

The teen account expansion—which may expand to other areas—is part of what's driving the increased scrutiny. With more young riders now eligible to ride under specific conditions, Waymo is leaning harder on verification to make sure solo minors aren't slipping through on adult accounts.

Waymo currently provides more than 250,000 paid trips per week across Phoenix, Arizona; the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles in California; Atlanta, Georgia; and Austin, Texas; with Miami, Florida and Washington, D.C. expansions in the works for 2026, NBC News reported.

What Does Waymo Do With What It Sees?

The age verification check is one thing. But it raises a broader question: what is Waymo actually doing with everything its cameras capture?

Quite a bit, it turns out. As the Guardian reported, Waymo's vehicles are equipped with cameras facing in all directions, inside and out. The exterior cameras help the car navigate; the interior ones are framed as a customer support tool. But the footage doesn't just stay with the company.

Waymo had already received at least nine search warrants for vehicle footage from law enforcement in San Francisco and Arizona. And because those requests often come with gag orders, the full extent of how often police have sought that footage isn't publicly known.

Riders agree to a privacy policy before getting in, and Waymo says it only complies with law enforcement requests when necessary. But anti-surveillance activist Albert Fox Cahn, director of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, put it bluntly to the Guardian, saying, "Where there's a camera, it's just one court order away from being used against you in a court of law."

It's not just footage, either. Pickup and drop-off locations are also data points that could theoretically end up in law enforcement's hands.

Cahn's concern is that the companies building these vehicles haven't thought hard enough about the ways that data could eventually be used against their own customers, or against bystanders who never agreed to be recorded at all.

How Do People Feel About Big Brother Waymo?

People have reservations about being surveilled inside their taxi.

“Why's it sound like the same person in every Waymo video,” one person wrote.

“This happened to me two times. I am 25,” another said.

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“Wait does that mean ppl are watching you the whole time while you're in the car,” another wondered.

Motor1 reached out to Addi via email and TikTok direct message for comment and to Waymo via email. We'll be sure to update this if either responds.

 

 

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