The China arm of electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla has instituted a court proceeding against a social media influencer for allegedly disseminating false information about the Model 3. The influencer has more than 14 million followers and is alleged to have simulated the malfunction of the Model 3 EV, and then published false claims relating to the car.

The automotive influencer in question, Xiaogang Xuezhang is seen as a car expert in many quarters and has a very large followership. The legal charge put together by Tesla China’s legal department against the media influencer was defamation, as noted by an official release by Tesla China. The case is the culmination of an extensive campaign by Tesla to warm bloggers and social media influencers to desist from publishing damaging and false information about Tesla vehicles. Defaulting persons were advised to publicly denounce such false claims or await a lawsuit. Several bloggers later publicly admitted that their claims were misleading.

There had been a few lawsuits against some of the false accusers who refused to denounce their claims. The latest lawsuit against the influencer with huge followership is the biggest lawsuit yet. Xiaogang Xuezhang has made several videos about testing and tuning cars which are placed on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok. He is alleged to have published two videos in April 2021 where he compared the automatic emergency braking system in the Tesla Model 3 with that of the XPeng P7, saying that the Tesla vehicle’s emergency braking system failed twice, which was a false claim.

Xuezhang’s claim has been challenged by some Tesla owners, stressing that the influencer may have stepped his foot on the accelerator deliberately. There are also claims that he was on a de-marketing campaign at the instance of Tesla’s competitors. It is unclear how the case will pan out but Tesla hopes it will serve as a further deterrent for persons who consistently make false claims against its vehicles.

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(source)

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