MISRA GASA – Guidelines for Automotive Safety Arguments

The MISRA “Guidelines for automotive safety arguments” provide clarity on how to develop safety arguments in line with existing standards, with a view to justifying that the risk associated with an automotive system is within industry norms. Types of evidence to support the argument are also suggested, as well as advice on practical application.

Though absolute safety, the absence of all risk, is an infeasible target, particularly for complex road vehicle systems involving embedded electronics and close interaction with human users, conformity with safety and quality standards and guidelines is necessary.

Engineers have an obligation to investigate and communicate the level of risk associated with their systems and services, and are expected to produce and explain the evidence for the safe design and use of these systems. A key part of this is explicitly justifying why the available evidence is sufficient and trustworthy.

The concept of Safety Cases has been widely adopted across the automotive industry and beyond. Most definitions of Safety Cases are centred on two concepts: evidence and argument. Current safety standards are, in general, good at providing detailed guidance on the different types of evidence that are recommended for meeting the compliance and safety requirements. However, there has been a lack of practical guidance on how safety arguments are developed, reviewed and maintained for automotive applications.

These guidelines provide a more holistic framework through which to develop safety arguments, with practical guidance and examples. 

The concepts are applicable to safety standards used in all industries and are illustrated by detailed application to ISO 26262:2018.

White Papers

The MISRA SC working group is currently producing a series of white papers that take a step back from the minutiae of technology and standards to consider the bigger picture of safety on the public roads. While we are motivated by the development of autonomous vehicles, we are actually starting with a consideration of the historic situation and what is effectively the undocumented safety argument. We hope that this will give an insight into what remains the same and what needs to change in the move to autonomous vehicles. These white papers can be downloaded from the Publications area. Anyone currently working in the autonomous vehicle sector wishing to contribute to these white papers can contact the MISRA SC Chair directly at [email protected]

The first white paper, ‘MISRA SC Safety assurance argument context for automated driving’, looks at personal transport modelled as a service and the implicit safety argument that could accompany it. It also considers the complete lifecycle safety argument for the vehicle and its parts. The white paper aims to lay the foundation to develop new insights in the way that we approach safety cases for future transportation.