Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off • Hacker News Board

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#331

Post by newscracker » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 8:43 AM UTC

employee8000 wrote: post #234

yladiz wrote: post #34

I saw this earlier and had hopes that the update would just let me choose "While Using" in the app settings, like some other apps allow you even if they request access even while not using the app, but the settings only allow for "Always" or "Never" on iPhone. However, you can use Uber without allowing GPS, so it's not all or nothing. I'm a little disturbed that they need any information after I use Uber though. They…

Uber employee here. We were told the reason to track up to 5 mins after the trip is for fraud, ex if a driver doesn't end the trip when she is supposed to. and to figure out where the pick up spots for each address are. A large building may have multiple points where people get picked up or dropped off and knowing those points would be very useful for the drivers and riders. And just as a side note, take it with a fe…

> There are thousands of engineers now working here and we would be the first ones who would stand up to management if we felt that something nefarious or even careless was being done with user's personal information.

How would you even know if "something nefarious or even careless was being done"? If there are thousands of employees, wouldn't it just be difficult for everyone to know what everyone else is working on, other "secret initiatives management has sponsored", etc.? There could be so many things happening right now where the information is "above your pay grade". My point is that even if the CEO or CTO or anyone else makes these statements, it's easy to be skeptical considering Uber's history and ethics.

I know many companies that allow one to report issues much higher in the chain, have "no retaliation" policies, and so on, but it's really a stretch to ask employees to fully trust the system and worse, ask people outside the organization to trust the employees and the system.

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#332

Post by aithoughts » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 8:45 AM UTC

dcosson wrote: post #277

greggman wrote: post #114

> Uber hopes to eliminate the most frustrating part of the experience: the game of phone tag that both the rider and driver play when trying to coordinate the pickup spot. This makes no sense to me. I tell them the pickup point so they don't need to know where I am since I already told them where I want to be picked up. Conversely I found it very frustrating they didn't (used to?) take destination into account. Examp…

I think there's a lot of variance between people, and it's largely a matter of preference. Some people are happy to walk a block or two in order to make the most efficient trip depending on where the driver is approaching from and where they're going, and some people just want to plop it down and not think about it and have the company/driver figure out how to come exactly to them and figure out which way to go.

I always feel like an oddball for calling my driver to make it more convenient for him (and faster for me) to pick me up. I usually Lyft line it though, so it's just a time boost (price is the same either way).

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#333

Post by ralfd » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 8:47 AM UTC

bogomipz wrote: post #74

omarforgotpwd wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it stays dead until the system decides to reload it. It may decide to do this for various reasons such a entering a geofence, significant location update, or push notification. But turning off background app refresh should prevent all of these things from turning on your app I think. Also low power mode can also be used as a sort of incognito mode because it stops all background activity to preserve battery.

>" It may decide to do this for various reasons such a entering a geofence..." Can you elaborate on this? Whats the connection with relaunching and a geofence?

Geofencing notifies your app when its device enters or leaves geographical regions you set up. If the App is terminated iOS will relaunch it IF the user gave it "Always" authorization for sharing location.

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#334

Post by lm2s » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 8:49 AM UTC

foodstances wrote: post #112

wheelerwj wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so this will disable location and all other data for uber if its not in the foreground?

That's a separate option. Settings -> Privacy -> Location Services -> Uber -> Never

I'm don't know why you were downvoted, background refresh has nothing to do with the location setting.

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#335

Post by flexie » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 8:50 AM UTC

yladiz wrote: post #34

I saw this earlier and had hopes that the update would just let me choose "While Using" in the app settings, like some other apps allow you even if they request access even while not using the app, but the settings only allow for "Always" or "Never" on iPhone. However, you can use Uber without allowing GPS, so it's not all or nothing. I'm a little disturbed that they need any information after I use Uber though. They…

Violation of privacy laws is one thing and bad enough in itself. But let's not forget that Uber violates various taxi laws as well. In Denmark, just now, the state prosecutor has formally prosecuted Uber for colluding to violate the taxi laws. So far, different Uber drivers have received fines and those fines have now been tried in appellate courts that upheld the fines. Now it's Uber's turn for its part in the violations.

I am not a big fan of those taxi laws, but I am not a fan of billion dollar corporations just doing as they are pleased either. They seem to have no regard for laws.

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#336

Post by newscracker » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 8:50 AM UTC

dx034 wrote: post #301

kbart wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Uber as a company is very ethical and takes the responsibility that we are entrusted with very seriously." Probably every company has said that, yet we know how that usually turns out sooner rather than later (I'm looking at you, WhatsApp). "So I know it's not easy to believe, and it's easy for me to say since I work here, but nothing nefarious is going on. If there was, we the engineers would be against it complete…

Whatsapp was ethical, the problem is with the company that bought them. And they didn't necessarily know that when they sold (even if, an offer of that size is hard to decline).

[Harsh words ahead]

Hindsight is 20/20, and based on that I personally would say WhatsApp was not ethical even when it was a standalone company. If it had been so, it wouldn't have allowed Facebook to acquire it in the first place! I realize this sounds harsh and probably implies bad motives on the owners, but whatever WhatsApp wrote in its blogs pre-acquisition were all principles that could be sold at the right price. That's exactly what it has come to now that we know how it's being used.

I would also consider it insulting to human intelligence if the WhatsApp founders had truly believed that they would be able to continue with their stated privacy stance after being bought by Facebook, of all companies (what they wrote on the blog at that time can be seen as public posturing).

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#337

Post by davidgerard » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 8:51 AM UTC

employee8000 wrote: post #234

yladiz wrote: post #34

I saw this earlier and had hopes that the update would just let me choose "While Using" in the app settings, like some other apps allow you even if they request access even while not using the app, but the settings only allow for "Always" or "Never" on iPhone. However, you can use Uber without allowing GPS, so it's not all or nothing. I'm a little disturbed that they need any information after I use Uber though. They…

Uber employee here. We were told the reason to track up to 5 mins after the trip is for fraud, ex if a driver doesn't end the trip when she is supposed to. and to figure out where the pick up spots for each address are. A large building may have multiple points where people get picked up or dropped off and knowing those points would be very useful for the drivers and riders. And just as a side note, take it with a fe…

> Uber as a company is very ethical

There are fairly substantial quantities of legal documentation that are evidence against this remarkable claim. They get covered here frequently.

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#338

Post by jfoldager » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 8:52 AM UTC

bad_user wrote: post #329

I actually noticed this - iOS has this nice feature of giving warnings like " Uber has been tracking your location ", which was a WTF moment for me because I haven't used Uber that day at all. So in response I've cut its location access completely. I've also had a similar experience with Waze. WTF are these apps doing with my location while I'm not using them? Btw, for all the badmouthing I've given Apple and iOS ove…

I was going to say that you can choose to only allow access to your location while using the app, but then I checked in iOS. Some apps only have the choice between always and never. Is it up to the developer to remove/put in the option "While Using the App"?

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#339

Post by ptx » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 8:56 AM UTC

julochrobak wrote: post #326

The situation is getting serious in general. There are many many apps that people use daily. How can one find out what data is being collected per application? It would be really nice to a have a web site where the community (technical people who can inspect the apps) could maintain this information per application and a user could see a simple green/red bullets and decide whether the app is worth it or not. Really,…

F-Droid shows a list of antifeatures[0] along with the description of each application. Here is one example with the "tracking antifeature": https://f-droid.org/repository/browse/?fdid=at.tomtasche.rea...

[0] https://f-droid.org/wiki/page/Antifeatures

Re: Uber Now Tracks Passengers’ Locations Even After They’re Dropped Off

#340

Post by zaidf » Fri, Dec 02, 2016, 9:01 AM UTC

newscracker wrote: post #331

employee8000 wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber employee here. We were told the reason to track up to 5 mins after the trip is for fraud, ex if a driver doesn't end the trip when she is supposed to. and to figure out where the pick up spots for each address are. A large building may have multiple points where people get picked up or dropped off and knowing those points would be very useful for the drivers and riders. And just as a side note, take it with a fe…

> There are thousands of engineers now working here and we would be the first ones who would stand up to management if we felt that something nefarious or even careless was being done with user's personal information. How would you even know if "something nefarious or even careless was being done"? If there are thousands of employees, wouldn't it just be difficult for everyone to know what everyone else is working on…

My roommate works at Uber as an engineer. He has a pretty high moral bar and I'd bet there are enough like him at Uber that doing shady things systematically would get exposed to the outside world fairly quickly. Notice I said systematically because any company at scale with thousands of employees may have lonewolves doing shady stuff. But that is different than a company culture that endorses or encourages that. I haven't gotten any vibe that Uber does either and if it did, I'm pretty certain my friend and engineers like him would jump in a heartbeat.