It seems to me that Uber here is facing its "Zenefits moment".
How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
601–610 of 805 posts
Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
#602How 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…
I'm totally on Uber side here. Both Uber users and drivers use the service voluntarily. It may discriminate, be unsafe, whatever, but I just ride a bus and don't care. When government tries to interfere with voluntary exchange, it is OK to circumvent it. See what HN says when government tries to prevent you from using certain websites or services (Signal messenger, just for example). We call it censorship, use VPNs a…
You don't care about discrimination? So it's OK for a restaurant or landlord or private college to post a sign saying, "Whites Only"?
Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
#603Glad to see the government being handed back some of it's own techniques. They seriously think they can spy on American citizens? Just wait until the the large tech companies start spying on them.
Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
#604Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree they have an obligation to obey the law. I disagree that they should lobby to change it. I understand that realistically that is what they will do, but I don't think it's the ethically correct thing. Laws are in place to benefit all of society, they shouldn't be changed on behalf of specific corporations, regardless of how much money the "donate".
So you oppose Apple and other tech companies lobbying for gay and transgender rights? Or Google lobbying for net neutrality?
No but I am for Google and Apple investors holding the management to their fiduciary duty to turn a profit. Lobbying for gay rights seems very loosely connected to that goal.
Edit: There is not a fiduciary duty to turn a profit, but there is a fiduciary duty to put the corporation's interests above your personal interests.
Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
#605Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think this is best exemplified by the 20th centuries most famous authoritarian, Martin Luther King Jnr
Again, civil disobedience accepts the legal consequences of its actions and is part of a vocal, public effort to change the laws the person or group deems unjust. The entire premise is to create better laws for everyone to abide by. Uber uses deception to shield itself from the consequences of its criminal actions and consolidate wealth for itself. I'm assuming you're not trolling, so think long and hard about your o…
In cities where Uber is legal and regulated, they are not breaking any laws and have no requirement to track city investigations against them.
Uber were also being disobedient in order to get better laws for they and everybody else to abide by.
Better yet - their technique pretty much won. There aren't many cities remaining that still attempt to ban ride sharing.
Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
#606Earlier quoted context omitted.
> we uphold the law and common norms and morality Well then I guess if your government lawfully asked you for a list of all your Muslim/Jewish/etc. customers or employees you would comply?
Hence "common norms and morality".
A: "I need a ride"
B: "I will give you a ride for $10"
A: "Okay!"
I would say a government interfering in such a simple transaction is immoral and violates common norms. Traditional taxi cabs and the gov't regulations that propped them up is a textbook example of rent-seeking.
Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
#607Earlier quoted context omitted.
This program was cleared by what I assume to be a highly paid, competent legal department. So I'm going to guess that you are wrong about the "illegal" part. They are a private business that can refuse service to anyone. Even businesses that aren't even close to breaking the law may have perfectly legitimate reasons to avoid serving people in law enforcement, whose job it often is to cause problems and increase expen…
Just because a lawyer has said something is "OK" doesn't make it legal. Lawyers (even expensive ones) give bad advice all the time for lots of various reasons, or advice that isn't bad at the time, but bad going forward. Did the lawyer understand this was being used to circumvent the law? Or did they understand it was to prevent violations of their terms of service? Is it possible the company either changed the plan…
http://abovethelaw.com/2016/09/unsatisfied-with-ham-sandwich...
Indictments mean next to nothing.
Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
#608It's sad that Uber has to go to such lengths to avoid busybody government officials from interfering in peaceful commercial transactions. The people of Portland should fire these officials. Not only are they wasting taxpayer money, but they are also imposing costs on Uber and their customers.
It's sad that sweatshop owners have to go to such lengths to avoid busybody government officials from interfering in peaceful commercial transactions with children. The people of the United States should fire these officials. Not only are they wasting taxpayer money, but they are also imposing costs on manufacturers and their customers. Uber has demonstrated a willingness to treat their employees like shit. The fact…
Regulators are not protecting the public when they go after Uber; they are protecting the monopoly profits of the taxi services. Uber, a ride-sharing service, is not a dangerous bacteria; it's not a sweatshop using child laborers; it's not false advertising; it's not children smoking cigarettes; and it's not predatory lending. Associating Uber with these is an attempt to substitute misdirection for honest arguments.
Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
#609Earlier quoted context omitted.
How dare Rosa Parks defiantly take a seat at the front of the bus.. How could she be so self-centered and... adolescent?
While subjective, there is a difference between breaking laws / fighting authority for moral reasons, and breaking laws for financial gain. Yeah, maybe you as an engineer would feel morally righteous for "fighting the man", but Uber doesn't care about that -- it just wants $$$.
Uber is fighting the man, in effort to capture $$$/market. That's their market. A business makes money?
As much as you wouldn't like to admit, they've broken through a market that was once monopolized and the cities had zero interest in doing anything about it.
You now have superior car ride services in part for the work they've done in the market. They have raised the bar.
Re: How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
#610Earlier quoted context omitted.
The system has extremely obvious use cases in abuse mitigation - it's basically HN shadow banning for car service. Only a few needed to know about the spot-the-officials aspect, and the rest is legitimate. And support don't need to know anything - if someone is reporting fake cars, they're an undesirable customer anyway so from Uber's standpoint, it's fine if support get confused and do a bad job.
From my read of the article, abuse mitigation seems to have been an early motivation for some components of this feature - in markets where, for example, competitors would threaten Uber drivers with damage against person or vehicle. And then someone got the bright idea of who else they could shadowban...
A Philadelphia agency was caught teaming up with taxi companies to fight Uber
http://www.vox.com/2016/1/30/10873372/uber-lyft-taxi-philade...