How Uber Used Secret “Greyball” Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide • Hacker News Board

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

#801

Post by devdas » Sun, Mar 05, 2017, 11:08 PM UTC

mindcrime wrote: post #333

briandear wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you need write Uber a letter? Don't like it, don't use it. You don't have a say in government like you do with a private company. If I don't like the government, I have to hope that millions of other people agree with me. If I don't like a company, I alone can choose not to associate with it. My relationship with or without Uber is entirely up to me. I'm forced to endure the government whether I like it or…

Also, corporations - as a rule - don't have huge armies made up of many people with guns, tanks, jet fighters, nuclear bombs, etc., which they can use to impose their will on you. It's a lot easier to divest yourself of a bad relationship with a company, than a nation-state. (And no, "move" isn't a reasonable response to this, so don't waste your digital breath with any Somalia references).

They were divested of this for good reasons.

http://history.stackexchange.com/questions/30739/is-there-a-... is a good starting point

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

#802

Post by tzs » Sun, Mar 05, 2017, 11:55 PM UTC

raattgift wrote: post #795

tzs wrote: post #793

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are my guesses. Not sure how educated they are. I'd expect it to depend on the nature of the post-Brexit relationship between the UK and the EU. They will have some sort of treaty or agreement on trade, and that will probably include something about handling taxes. In the best case they cooperate fully and keep the VAT MOSS system working like it does now. That will result in no change from a VAT reporting and…

Thank you for the interesting reply. One question: > UK VAT MOSS system cannot be used by UK merchants to report UK VAT. They can only use it to report non-UK VAT Why is that? Was it a deliberate choice by the UK tax authorities?

I don't know for sure why it works that way.

My guess would be that it is because each country has its own rules about how VAT works for for things sold to buyers in their country. Each country would like to fully apply its rules to all purchases by its residents, but they recognize that it would be unwieldy and expensive for sellers to have to deal with minutia of the VAT rules of a couple dozen different countries.

VAT MOSS is a compromise that simplifies the rules, so that a seller selling into several foreign EU countries only has to deal with one unified set of rules through the VAT system. Instead of having to know details of the tax law of several countries, the seller only need to know the VAT rate for each. That's much easier to deal with.

I'd guess that they don't apply VAT MOSS to sales by domestic sellers to domestic buyers because they consider their own tax rules superior to the rules under VAT MOSS.

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

#803

Post by pyrale » Mon, Mar 06, 2017, 10:33 AM UTC

rand77763 wrote: post #723

pyrale wrote: post #685

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We do have quite a lot of advancement which comes without violating the law. Also breaking the social canvas to correct something you feel is unfairly repressed/enforced is not something to do lightly. Let me give you an example here. I think Uber is a bad thing, but there's nothing I can do to oppose them, legally, that is. Should I carry out my own justice, illegally ? You can see that this pattern of thought quick…

God, I wish HN had a downvote button.

Why, exactly ?

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

#804

Post by stefek99 » Mon, Mar 06, 2017, 11:25 AM UTC

Fede_V wrote: post #39

This is incredibly awful, but not particularly surprising. One of Paul Graham's most read essays is about the qualities that YC looks for in founders ( http://paulgraham.com/founders.html ). In that essay, he specifically discusses 'Naughtiness' as a positive quality, and how it's one of the most important features of potential founders. The problem is that being clever and hacking around a system for curiosity is go…

Hacking reality. Magic. Genius.

No wonder why they are $100B company.

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

#805

Post by zymhan » Mon, Mar 06, 2017, 7:31 PM UTC

eddieplan9 wrote: post #260

zymhan wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, while I'm outraged that Uber would go to such lengths to deceive the government, and by extension the people, there's certainly a bit of schadenfreude here.

Deceiving the government does not necessarily extend to deceiving the people. It depends on whether the government represents people's interest in the case. In the Portland's case in particularly, it's absolutely certain the the government was not siding with the interest of the majority of the people. Similarly, if someone is protesting drone strike, it does not mean he is protesting against the US people.

While the majority of people would surely like to have a cheaper, faster, easier taxi service available, that doesn't mean that Uber should be allowed to operate regardless of the municipality's laws.

A city is a democracy, and Uber could certainly lead a campaign to convince citizens to get their political leaders to allow Uber to operate. There are plenty of ways to affect change that aren't just flouting the law.