Apparently in the UK almost every inevitable crash will end with the driver swerving right, usually putting his passenger in harm (driver sits on the right). I'm told that's a natural and unavoidable reaction, so if it's true I assume the opposite holds for America and etc. I guess that's another decision the car has to make, do you hit an unavoidable obstacle head on or swerve, presumably drastically changing the survival chances of each passenger. The baseline human panic reaction is almost certainly easy to 'beat' but it's a horrifying though that a car would have to make that decision.
I've always thought that the protection part was a fallacy and the more obvious conclusion is that they swerve in the direction they are used to safely passing with.