Safety of Autonomous Systems Working Group (SASWG) has identified a set of the most significant safety challenges considering the following aspects ^[1]:

• Domain-specific expert opinions on high-level issues within the domain
• A set of modelled example systems and their possible use cases
• Analysis of control software in autonomous systems
• Analysis of experienced accidents – a small but representative set of accidents

According to those considerations, the SASWG has defined a domain-specific safety topic to be discussed, considered or addressed by national/international regulations ^[2].

• Existing regulations are well established and used for decades. However, this experience is not directly based on autonomous control software applications, which creates challenges to ensure software robustness
• Interface with Air Traffic Control, which currently is based on verbal communication with Air Traffic Control operators. Autonomous systems will most likely require dedicated digital communication channels and protocols, which brings novel solutions with appropriate safety challenges
• Third-party risks, which usually are related to the limited possibility to isolate third party systems. This creates risks of interaction, software updates, protocol updates, etc… As consequence regulations might be developed far too detailed creating risks of hard implementations and potential violation
• Reliance on external systems is current practice. However, in case of malfunctioning of navigation systems like GNSS, there is always a pilot/operator, who takes over the control and uses visual information to navigate. In autonomous systems, this way of action might be problematic and therefore it creates safety risks
• Removal of human senses as health monitors might be a source of additional safety risks since pilots usually get acquainted with the system they are operating. Removing pilot from the loop created risks of running into situations that are not properly recognized by automatic software systems.