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How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

nytimes.com

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Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#481

Post by nemacol »

darawk wrote: post #420
nemacol wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, if we stick with Uber and transportation topic. Labor laws, minimum wage, vehicle inspections, registration. systems and rules that were put in place as a response to what citizens felt were "wrongs" that needed to be addressed. When a organization ignores those laws then they are going against the will of the people.

What is the will of the people? How is it expressed? Through representative elections? What about Arrow's impossibility theorem? The 'will of the people' on the issue of Uber is abundantly clear. Everyone wants it, except taxi drivers and the companies and structures that benefit from them. This gets blocked sometimes due to the fact that taxi drivers represent a concentrated interest against a diffuse benefit. We al…

I wonder how many Uber drivers and riders vote? ~160k drivers in USA (according to their twitter posts). How many users?

Where is the pro Uber Lobby? Don't have one? Start one! You are clearly in favor of this type of program. If you truly believe that it is the right thing then be part of the solution that makes it happen.

They raised their voices against it.. You have to speak up for "the rest of us". Be the change that we need in the world.

I believe in you.

Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#482

Post by losteverything »

chickenfries wrote: post #95
oculusthrift wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you not think the boycottUber thing was a little overblown? What about releasing the video of Kalanick being illegally recorded and framing it as him "exploding" when he was relatively calm? All I'm saying is that focuses on silly stuff like that undermines the larger disturbing cases of law breaking and sexism.

Why not assume people are being genuine? Uber has done tons of things to piss people off. I think people in the HN bubble forget that the majority of the country has never been in a ride share. Talk to some blue collar people. Talk to some taxi drivers. Talk to drivers who left Uber. You might find that they aren't as sympathetic to Kalanick as people on HN are. HN in general has more sympathy for corporations and bi…

I'm genuinely curious. Where else is conversation worth reading daily?

Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#483

Post by wav-part »

anigbrowl wrote: post #165
lacampbell wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't like the US government much, but I like it a lot better than the average multinational. When it comes down to it, we don't have more than our choice of devils. If I don't like Uber, I can... stop using Uber. What can I do if I don't like the service a state provides - can I opt out and stop paying? No, my only option is to flee - which the state will often try and prevent you doing anyway. The state is a huge…

Sorry, services like Uber have externalities and do not only impact their consumers. Your only option to avoid this involuntary charge s to flee Bollocks. People organize for and achieve their political goals by modifying government on a regular basis. Governmental institutions suffer from numerous flaws, but your argument is that government is fundamentally totalitarian which is nonsense.

No. Notice the word "voluntary". From libertarian point of view, Socialism is ok if you voluntary opt-in. Voluntary/Consent is central point in libertarianism.

Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#484

Post by joering2 »

The question I'm not getting answers through reading comments here is this: can someone go to jail for this?

That's the most important thing. Anything else is a noise, even if considered bad PR I don't think those who hail for a cheap ride could care less.

Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#485

Post by mikeash »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #442
mikeash wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd think they would mention that the law was bad if that was their justification here.

Maybe not. That might tie their hands in court. It might leave "have the court declare the law invalid" as their only way to win. Limiting your options that way tends to be bad legal strategy (whether or not it would be the moral high ground). Disclaimer: IANAL.

It seems to me that saying "we did this so we can violate the law without getting caught" is already an extremely bad legal strategy. If their statement was aimed at limiting their legal exposure it wouldn't have included that part at all. If it was aimed at showing that they're morally in the right, they would have said that the laws were bad. I can't see anything that justifies what they said, aside from thinking everyone sees the law the same way they do so it goes without saying.

Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#486

Post by TeMPOraL »

HorizonXP wrote: post #6

How diabolical! In a world where privacy has been traded away for convenience, it's poetic justice where a startup uses data mining techniques to subvert the government. This is the same government that would have no issues to use the same techniques to spy on its own people for its own motives. I'm neither on Uber nor the government's side in this case, just simply making an observation. The lack of data privacy see…

So far, at least in the West, it's mostly private companies that form the "surveillance state" and that use collected data to fuck with people.

Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#487

Post by zepto »

zhengyi13 wrote: post #383
tyingq wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"blocks them from the service" doesn't quite capture it right. It doesn't tell them they are blocked. It displays fake cars circling that never show up.

I'm reminded of the Reddit shadow ban, myself.

Or the HN shadow ban

Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#488

Post by sqeaky »

scarhill wrote: post #259
rhino369 wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If I don't like Uber, I can... stop using Uber. Even ignoring the fact that Uber might become a monopoly, this ignores extrenalities caused by corporations. You don't have to purchase chemicals from a chemical factory to be impacted by them dumping toxic chemicals into the water supply because it is cheaper.

Can you describe the steps that would lead to Uber becoming a monopoly? I can't imagine that happening without government help, can you? And if it requires that kind of help, is the problem with Uber or government?

If they continue to evade law enforcement and ignore the laws that taxi companies follow they will have an unfair advantage over taxi companies. Taxi companies have and will continue to go out of business. If you follow this reasoning to its logical extreme you have an Uber monopoly.

Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#489

Post by TeMPOraL »

danielweber wrote: post #458
dragonwriter wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Uber isn't a monopoly. Like every startup (and most companies), it aims to be; a moat is pricing power is an absence of substitute is monopoly.

Sure, they want to be a monopoly. But they're not. Seriously, how do they get lock-in of riders or drivers? Installing a second app is a really really low bar. You can't do predatory pricing forever.

They don't have to. Drivers are dime a dozen for them.

Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide

#490

Post by [deleted] »

SilasX wrote: post #338
jfoutz wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. It's genius in a Lex Luthor kind of way. If I understood the full scope of the application, I like to think i'd decline to work on that. It's easy to imagine engineers working on small parts of the system, and never really connecting the dots that the whole point is to evade law enforcement. There's a big difference between keeping secrets for market advantage and to evade the law. In the first case, I want…

>If I understood the full scope of the application, I like to think i'd decline to work on that. It's easy to imagine engineers working on small parts of the system, and never really connecting the dots that the whole point is to evade law enforcement. It reminds me of the VW emissions cheating case: "Hey, have it detect whether the test cycle is running and emit a signal if true." 'Um... why would the system need to…

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