Patent ID: 8798867

Claim:
A method for operating a pedestrian protection system in a motor vehicle for reducing severity of an accident in a frontal collision with a pedestrian, comprising: evaluating measurement data from at least two detection devices operating according to different measurement principles, wherein one of the at least two detection devices is an optical detection device and another of the at least two detection devices is a collision sensor responsive to contact with a collision object, determining a threshold value for triggering at least one safety system of the motor vehicle based on a height criterion which indicates whether a height of the collision object determined from measurement data from the optical detection device exceeds a height threshold value, determining a plausibility value based on the determined height criterion to indicate whether the collision object represents a pedestrian, when the plausibility value indicates that the collision object represents a pedestrian, adapting a criterion relating to measurement data from the other of the at least two detection devices for triggering of the at least one safety system, and decreasing a threshold for triggering the at least one safety system based on the adapted criterion.