Liability is the part that's legally required in the US. If the numbers showed that self-driving cars were much less likely to cause an accident, it would be considerably cheaper for them (a much more dramatic version of how anti-lock brakes can make your liability coverage cheaper).

Comprehensive (mainly stuff that happens while you're not in the vehicle) would remain unchanged. But it's also the cheapest part.

Collision is what covers repairs to your own vehicle if you're at fault or if someone at fault isn't insured themselves (you can also skip the first part and just get uninsured motorist coverage). The uninsured at-fault driver case doesn't change until there are enough self-driving cars on the road that accidents as a whole go way down, but the first case (damage to your own vehicle that was your own fault) should be much less likely and thus cheaper to insure.

Insurance covers much more than drivers running into other things - theft of vehicle, parts of vehicle, or damage to vehicle and theft of contents - fire + natural disasters (flood etc) - damage to the vehicle by other drivers, both moving and parked - personal liability for damage while using the car - damage to the car from accidents

Note that in multiple vehicle accidents sometimes 'blame' is shared out between insurance companies as a way of sharing costs.

As to the fiction that accidents will never happen with autonomous cars, this is simply false. Of course there will still be accidents. The accident rate should decrease but this will take a long, long time to happen.

Take this example : workers have a self-driving pickup, but don't secure a ladder on the roof properly. While driving along the freeway, the ladder comes off and smashes into self-driving car behind. Neither self-driving car can prevent this. Same goes for self-driving cars failing to detect black ice on the road and skidding into railings/trees/other traffic.

Liability for accidents with self-drive vehicles will fall on the owner of the vehicle, possibly with insurers pooling 'fault' when one or more self-driving vehicles are involved.

"PriusBot has detected you are not authorised to use this vehicle. In accordance with law XYZ-00A, you are now being driven to the nearest police station as a precaution."

"PriusBot has detected you have been classified as a public menace. In accordance with statute XYZ-00N, you are now being driven off the nearest bridge."

But a self-driving car would almost inevitably be connected to a network: an central computer could algorithmically control where all the cars are, where they're moving, how fast they're doing it, and basically make accidents nonexistent; such a system would be enormously beneficial to society at large. Yet, the downside is that all the cars are connected to a network, which an attacker could use to, as you say, send the target "off the nearest bridge".

1. http://www.secure-medicine.org/icd-study/icd-study.pdf

Our investigation shows that an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (1) is potentially susceptible to malicious attacks that violate the privacy of patient information and medical telemetry, and (2) may experience malicious alteration to the integrity of information or state, including patient data and therapy settings for when and how shocks are administered. Moreover, standard approaches for security and access control may not always be suitable for IMDs due to tensions between security (e.g., access for pre-authorized parties only) and safety (e.g., access for previously unauthorized parties in emergency circumstances)

Nsa will have e911 equivalent and warrantable backdoor to anything DMV/govt approved, though one would think.

[1] Some physical design limits were cpu and power, plus other operational concerns.

Apr 19, 2012 – A bill passed in the U.S. Senate would require black boxes to be installed in all new cars sold in the U.S. by 2015

It depends on what you pick for coverage and what car you are driving, but for me roughly 50% of my bill goes to liability and 50% goes to comprehensive coverage.

In a world with self driving cars, your liability wouldn't be 0 but it would be lower. The 50% that goes to comprehensive coverage would remain. That covers theft, falling trees, flooding, fires, etc.

Because of that, you likely wil have to pay a premium on top of the 'real' costs of such a car to the seller of the electronics, either as a lump sum, or as a per year and/or kilometer contribution.

Yes, it should be. However do you think that insurance companies are going to allow that? They'll form the insurance-equivalent of the RIAA before that happens.

Besides, insurance companies make money on the difference between rates and claims. If claims fall significantly, rates can, too, yet the insurance companies can still take home the same sized paycheck.

This isn't true, but is a common misconception.

Insurance companies make money by earning an investment income on the retained premium (the premium earnt between when a policy is paid for, and a claim is paid out). You can easily see this by reading analyst reports on publicly-listed insurance companies, which will analyse in detail the return on the retained premium.

An insurance company collecting more premium than claim costs is overpricing itself. An insurance company paying out more claims than premium is underpricing itself.

The idea is that the risk is managed through actuarial study, so the premium/claim payout is managed, giving an optimal time lag between collected premium and paid out claims.

The ability of insurance companies to create a very large pool of investment funds is why Warren Buffet buys them. He is an expert at investing, and the premium pool gives him the size he needs.

[1]: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1236020/Horror-ride-...