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Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

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Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#41

Post by geofft »

employee8000 wrote: post #28
EugeneOZ wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This quote from another employee also looks naive now (and I'm not trying to offend him): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13086454

No, I'm not naive, and I, proudly, stand behind everything I wrote. The person in the article was terminated before I joined, so I don't know what the systems were like back then, but every time I access production systems, I have a ton of messages telling me that our access is being completely tracked and we are prohibited from doing anything that was mentioned in the article. I haven't actually tested to see what I…

... It's very easy to add those messages and not actually track people. Not even on purpose, necessarily; just set up monitoring and then get distracted by more important things because your employees are good people and checking logs is likely a waste of time.

That judgment is probably even correct until you happen to hire a bad person one day.

Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#42

Post by slashink »

droopyEyelids wrote: post #29

Can we make the rule that it's not OK to post negative stories about YCombinator companies on this site? There are a million places to talk negative about everyhing. Here, we're trying to build things. We know no one is perfect. Lets make this place a bastion of positivity instead of negativity.

I see what you're getting at and understand what you want to accomplish but I do not agree. These revelations concern tons of engineers, especially those working or considering interviewing for Uber right now. It's also a service many of us use, hence why it's so jarring to see that privacy is handled with such little respect.

This negative article is no different from the articles posted about Theranos, Amazon, Facebook etc. Uber does not get a free pass.

Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#43

Post by piyushpr134 »

droopyEyelids wrote: post #29

Can we make the rule that it's not OK to post negative stories about YCombinator companies on this site? There are a million places to talk negative about everyhing. Here, we're trying to build things. We know no one is perfect. Lets make this place a bastion of positivity instead of negativity.

Uber is not a small 10 person startup. It affects everyone of us. Would you be so forgiving if this would have been a Russian or a Chinese firm doing this ?

Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#44

Post by robrenaud »

dominotw wrote: post #39
mwfj wrote: post #3

This seems like a good place to tell Uber users that the only way of removing your credit card details from your Uber account is to either: a) plead with Uber's customer service to do so or b) add another payment method (like another credit card) This, of course, is horribly bad practice. I can only imagine that they arrived at this very peculiar arrangement after extensive A/B testing - Uber has hired plenty of FB f…

>So, no, I'm not surprised that this company is doing other unethical things - it sort of seems interwoven into their DNA. Grubhub refused to delete my account even after pleading with them to do so many many times. To me seems like a general tech company trend not something specific to uber.

Is it legal to refuse to delete a users account?

Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#45

Post by gnu8 »

employee8000 wrote: post #28
EugeneOZ wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This quote from another employee also looks naive now (and I'm not trying to offend him): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13086454

No, I'm not naive, and I, proudly, stand behind everything I wrote. The person in the article was terminated before I joined, so I don't know what the systems were like back then, but every time I access production systems, I have a ton of messages telling me that our access is being completely tracked and we are prohibited from doing anything that was mentioned in the article. I haven't actually tested to see what I…

For what purposes are you allowed or prohibited to access user location data? Which external firm is auditing the access to user location data? Where are the public reports of these audits?

Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#46

Post by employee8000 »

droopyEyelids wrote: post #38
employee8000 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I'm not naive, and I, proudly, stand behind everything I wrote. The person in the article was terminated before I joined, so I don't know what the systems were like back then, but every time I access production systems, I have a ton of messages telling me that our access is being completely tracked and we are prohibited from doing anything that was mentioned in the article. I haven't actually tested to see what I…

I don't know if you're being serious or you're trying to damn them with faint praise by mentioning they changed their MOTD as a 'security measure' If you want to defend uber, it's pretty easy, just say there you know people that work on the team that audits the logs of employee access to personal data every quarter, and if those logs aren't justified by a ticket people get fired.

I have no idea what you're talking about, I'm just telling the truth. I don't access customer information, and I don't know anyone who audits the logs so I can't comment on those. I also don't know what other processes are in place, I'm sure there are others, but I've just never had to deal with it so I don't know. But I trust that Uber takes the security of their customers information very very seriously.

The image of Uber being a brogrammers haven just isn't true anymore. There are thousands of engineers working that care very much about the company and our customers, including drivers and riders.

Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#47

Post by michaelvoz »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #18

Don't forget that Uber now requires you allow them to access your location, even when you aren't using their app [1]. Side note: consider the value to foreign (or domestic) intelligence agencies of this weakly-guarded pot of gold. [1] http://www.theverge.com/2016/11/30/13763714/uber-location-da...

Disclaimer: I work for Uber. However, my opinions are mine. I am also not defending nor attacking in any way Uber gathering location data.

With that out of the way - you know your cell phone carrier already has this data right? They have way better data than Uber ever will about all your habits, including establishing relationships based on who you call, which sites you visit, who you are signed up on a plan with, etc etc. A much more weakly guarded pot of gold, I would say.

Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#48

Post by sidchilling »

I seriously don't understand why the updated Uber app asks to access my location all the time -- as opposed to only when I'm using the app. Not only is it not required but it's a huge drain on the phone's battery, potentially decreasing the battery's life.

Now I'm from a third-world country and can't afford to buy a $1000 phone every year, so I have to be careful with the life of my phone.

The turnaround this, I found, is to disallow location to the Uber app when not using the app and allowing access only when I use the app. This, however, is a pain and the Uber app behaves weird if I do so (the previous trip does not end after hours of it actually ending).

Very poor UX from Uber, potentially dangerous, definitely unethical. This is definitely a trend -- startups start with being caring of its customers, but once they grow big, they become callous and even malicious when it comes to users (I don't ask of them to give every customer personal support, but not mis-using customers is the least I can expect).

Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#49

Post by michaelvoz »

employee8000 wrote: post #28
EugeneOZ wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This quote from another employee also looks naive now (and I'm not trying to offend him): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13086454

No, I'm not naive, and I, proudly, stand behind everything I wrote. The person in the article was terminated before I joined, so I don't know what the systems were like back then, but every time I access production systems, I have a ton of messages telling me that our access is being completely tracked and we are prohibited from doing anything that was mentioned in the article. I haven't actually tested to see what I…

Uber employee here too. Would never ever check any data of anyone not related to debugging crashes, race conditions, unexpected app behavior etc etc, its just not worth losing my job. Despite the bad press it is actually a pretty freaking great place to work. Also wanna +1 the warnings about data access and only looking at PII for legitimate purposes are all over the place.

Re: Uber employees used the platform to stalk celebrities and their exes

#50

Post by reacharavindh »

michaelvoz wrote: post #47
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #18

Don't forget that Uber now requires you allow them to access your location, even when you aren't using their app [1]. Side note: consider the value to foreign (or domestic) intelligence agencies of this weakly-guarded pot of gold. [1] http://www.theverge.com/2016/11/30/13763714/uber-location-da...

Disclaimer: I work for Uber. However, my opinions are mine. I am also not defending nor attacking in any way Uber gathering location data. With that out of the way - you know your cell phone carrier already has this data right? They have way better data than Uber ever will about all your habits, including establishing relationships based on who you call, which sites you visit, who you are signed up on a plan with, et…

So, it's okay to get customer's location data 24/7 because someone else does it is your best argument and reasoning?
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