Uber CEO Plays with Fire • Hacker News Board

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#131

Post by tyingq » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:12 PM UTC

plg wrote: post #124

"Using an email digest service it owns named Unroll.me, Slice collected its customers’ emailed Lyft receipts from their inboxes and sold the anonymized data to Uber. " Can someone explain to me the mechanics of how this happens? I use Lyft, which emails me a receipt. How does Slice get a hold of this? Does Lyft sell it to Slice?

It's pretty sleazy.

See https://unroll.me

It purports to be a convenient tool for end users. But sells them out for revenue.

Edit: I'm sure it's in the terms somewhere. But to me, something this intrusive should be stated up front if it's not obvious.

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#132

Post by azinman2 » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:12 PM UTC

babuskov wrote: post #105

azinman2 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such key stores are wiped on erase. They more likely used the wifi MAC address.

Can't one simply change the MAC address like you can do on PC?

Maybe if you're jail broken? But if you're not then no way.

I believe I tried long long ago on iOS and couldn't get it to work, but I don't know if I'm remembering correctly.

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#133

Post by TeMPOraL » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:12 PM UTC

pdog wrote: post #36

From the article, explained: At the time, Uber was dealing with widespread account fraud in places like China, where tricksters bought stolen iPhones that were erased of their memory and resold. Some Uber drivers there would then create dozens of fake email addresses to sign up for new Uber rider accounts attached to each phone, and request rides from those phones, which they would then accept. Since Uber was handing…

What goes around comes around. Reminds me of that time when Uber would issue throwaway credit cards and burner iPhones to people, so that they would order and cancel Lyft rides...

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#134

Post by specializeded » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:12 PM UTC

plg wrote: post #124

"Using an email digest service it owns named Unroll.me, Slice collected its customers’ emailed Lyft receipts from their inboxes and sold the anonymized data to Uber. " Can someone explain to me the mechanics of how this happens? I use Lyft, which emails me a receipt. How does Slice get a hold of this? Does Lyft sell it to Slice?

(From unroll.me's copy on their front page)

Instantly see a list of all your subscription emails. Unsubscribe easily from whatever you don’t want.

Unroll.Me is a free service

So they analyse an inbox, and siphon the data in the process.

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#135

Post by cabaalis » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:12 PM UTC

maxerickson wrote: post #24

It'd be nice if Apple had been less pragmatic and more principled and just yanked any version of the Uber app that broke the rules.

When there's that much VC money on the line, breaking the rules gets you a meeting with Tim Cook.

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#136

Post by macspoofing » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:12 PM UTC

pfortuny wrote: post #48

As always with corporate "justice", if you are big enough and transgress, you simply get a slap. If you are a tiny developer, your app is out of the store and may be at some point you may get it back. Truly blind justice.

I think a case should be made for pragmatism. Informing an app maker they are breaking rules when their app is installed on hundreds of millions of devices is the right move ... for your customers.

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#137

Post by ams6110 » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:12 PM UTC

stevenwoo wrote: post #76

refulgentis wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they're referring to Keychain items surviving an app deletion. That quietly stopped working in a recent iOS update.

Was the keychain item surviving app deletion a feature that was dropped or an undocumented feature?

If it "quietly stopped working" I'd have to assume the latter.

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#138

Post by ErikAugust » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:13 PM UTC

Buried lede here:

"They spent much of their energy one-upping rivals like Lyft. Uber devoted teams to so-called competitive intelligence, purchasing data from an analytics service called Slice Intelligence. Using an email digest service it owns named Unroll.me, Slice collected its customers’ emailed Lyft receipts from their inboxes and sold the anonymized data to Uber. Uber used the data as a proxy for the health of Lyft’s business. (Lyft, too, operates a competitive intelligence team.)"

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#139

Post by ksherlock » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:13 PM UTC

plg wrote: post #124

"Using an email digest service it owns named Unroll.me, Slice collected its customers’ emailed Lyft receipts from their inboxes and sold the anonymized data to Uber. " Can someone explain to me the mechanics of how this happens? I use Lyft, which emails me a receipt. How does Slice get a hold of this? Does Lyft sell it to Slice?

"Unroll.Me is a free service". Looks like people forward their email to unroll.me which creates a digest version of all your Facebook notifications or something.

Re: Uber CEO Plays with Fire

#140

Post by gk1 » Sun, Apr 23, 2017, 5:14 PM UTC

odonnellryan wrote: post #120

valuearb wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The immigrants driving 12 hours a day are paying hella rents to the taxi companies for that privilege. There is a reason NYC taxi medallions were being traded for over $1M, because the taxi companies lobbied to limit the supply of taxis and were making massive profits leasing those medallions to drivers.

There are other reasons why you'd want to limit the number of drivers. It is not good for NYC to have too many taxis, or too many Uber or Lyft drivers. There should be enough, but there is a point where there are too many people driving through the streets of NYC looking to pick up riders.

Firstly, what's "not good" about having too many taxis or Uber/Lyft drivers? I don't think people in the outer boroughs would complain.

Secondly, even if there's a good reason why that's bad, it's a problem that would sort itself out. The supply (drivers) will decrease until it meets demand (riders).