USA: Uber Applies For Patent To Identify Drunken Passengers

Popular taxi app Uber has applied for a patent to use artificial intelligence to determine how drunk a potential passenger may be.

According to the company’s application, made to the US patent office, the new technology would allow them to spot uncharacteristic user activity by monitoring customers’ activity as they use the Uber app.

These variables could include: walking speed, unusual spelling errors made while typing on the app, the angle at which a potential passenger holds the phone and whether the phone is moving in an abnormal way.

Thought the patent application does not explicitly refer to identifying drunk or otherwise inebriated passengers,it uses terms such as predicting user state using machine learning and uncharacteristic user states, vetting intoxicated passengers is the most likely application for a system built to spot typos or unusual swaying motions.

The patent application suggests various ways that Uber may tailor their service if a user is seen to be exhibiting uncharacteristic user activity.

For example, they may be directed to a well-lit pickup point, or they may be matched with a driver trained to deal with drunk passengers.

Uber also suggest that intoxicated passengers may be prevented from pooling with other app users.

Many critics have suggested that Uber’s new proposed system may allow drivers to exploit intoxicated passengers.

The company has seen several serious data breaches over the last few years, and in 2014 came under criticism for its use of the controversial God View software program.

The software allowed the company to monitor real-time locations of customers and drivers.

In 2016, the company’s former forensic investigator Samuel Ward Spangenberg concluded that the software was abused by employees who used it to track ex-partners and celebrities.

A recent investigation revealed that 103 Uber drivers have been accused of sexual assaulting or abuse in the US over the last four years.

Some have expressed concern that the patent may make certain passengers more vulnerable.

In a statement, Uber said: We are always exploring ways that our technology can help improve the Uber experience for riders and drivers. We file patent applications on many ideas, but not all of them actually become products or features.


Tourism Observer

USA: Uber Driver Throws Two Women Out Of Taxi For Kissing

An Uber driver kicked out two women from his car after he saw them kiss in the back seat and called the act illegal.

The driver was identified as Ahmad el Boutari and his taxi licence, required to drive for Uber in New York City, has been suspended.

The New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission were investigating the incident.

Alex Iovine, 26, and Emma Pichl, 24, have been dating for nearly two years and were heading back to Manhattan last week after celebrating a friend's birthday at a bar.

Iovine said she and her girlfriend were sitting on opposite sides of the back seat when they kissed.

The middle seat was open. We were just having a conversation throughout the ride and, at one point, we leaned over into the middle and peck-kissed, Iovine said.

That's genuinely all it was.

Uber has listed community guidelines on its website, which specify that you shouldn't touch or flirt with other people in the car and that there's no sexual conduct with drivers or fellow riders, no matter what.

But both Iovine and Pichl said they kissed once and were not touching inappropriately.

We understand that someone would feel uncomfortable if people were making out in the car, Iovine said. But that's not what was going on here.

The two women said several minutes after their peck, the driver pulled over onto the side of a Manhattan road, away from their destination, walked over to the rear passenger side door and opened it, telling them to get out.

He told the women that such kissing was illegal and disrespectful.

El Boutari said that he was uncomfortable with the couple's behaviour in his car on the whole, not just with the kiss.

He said they played loud videos on their phones and that one of the women put her feet up on the seats.

However, Iovine said they didn't behave inappropriately. Both the driver and the riders reported the incident to Uber.

The women Uber refunded their $15 fare. Uber spokeswoman Susan Hendrick said that the company removed the driver's access to the app and that it was investigating the incident.

Uber does not tolerate any form of discrimination and we have been in touch with the rider regarding her experience, Hendrick said.

Iovine and Pichl said the incident changed their perspective on being in a same-sex couple in New York City.

They now plan to attend the city's June 24 Pride parade, which celebrates the LGBTQ community.


Tourism Observer

HONG KONG: UBER, Do Not Undermine Our Monopolies,Or We Will Shut You Down

The arrests signal and symbolise what the Hong Kong government really thinks of technology: write all the apps you wish but do not undermine any of our monopolies. Or we will shut you down.

The taxi driver whipped out a tired-looking placard and reminded me of yet another regular increase in local taxi fares.

I paid cash, without complaining, for another uncomfortable ride in a dilapidated taxi that does not take credit, debit or stored-value cards and devices – in the 21st century.

It was like an existential scene out of Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver, where the loser-hero cannot understand the senselessness of the situation.

But there is a darker, more ignorant and sinister conspiracy against technology development in Hong Kong.

Technology is only supported if you do not threaten traditional, entrenched industries in the city – no matter what service improvements you offer for the general public.

Last week, 22 Uber drivers were arrested in Hong Kong on suspicion of driving without a permit to operate a hired car and without third-party insurance during a three-week undercover police operation that ended with a series of raids across the city.

It certainly was a priority because it was the biggest operation of its kind, according to a report that cited police insiders.

They said the crackdown was “necessary” because a March court ruling against the city’s controversial online car-hailing service failed to discourage drivers from joining Uber.

It could have been worse. At least Hong Kong’s Uber drivers were not beaten up and forced to witness their cars torched like the ones in Paris.

However, this perverse campaign makes Hong Kong look exceedingly foolish, backward and hypocritical as it tries to market itself as a technology hub and gateway to the China technology market, where ride-sharing apps thrive.

InvestHK, the government’s foreign investment arm, is unable to explain how it assisted the establishment of Uber in Hong Kong, only to silently stand aside while Uber is persecuted like an international criminal organisation.

Then, our Innovation and Technology Bureau is simply mute in the face of the government’s attack on one of the world’s leading technology start-ups.

The mandate of the bureau is: We aim to develop Hong Kong into a knowledge-based economy and an innovation hub for technology and its application in the region.

To do this, it will strengthen support for the innovation and technology sector; facilitate the development of the information and communications technology industry, encourage commercialisation of research and development results, among others.

Uber Hong Kong, founded in mid-2014, has so far served one million passengers in the city using more than 30,000 drivers, with 80 per cent of them working as part-timers.

It certainly represents a proven and commercialised business suitable for Hong Kong.

Instead, we must witness the shameless protection of an old industry and a decrepit business model against innovative technology that threatens an existing monopoly.

Entrenched interests have persuaded the government to purge a clear and present business threat.

Disintermediation always causes pain among the established order, which will resist at all costs to public benefit.

While other major metropolitan areas have found a way to work Uber’s services into the insurance regime, the Hong Kong government has procrastinated for more than two years.

But worst of all, it signals and symbolises what the Hong Kong government really thinks of technology: write all the apps you wish but do not undermine any of our monopolies. Or we will shut you down.

All the glossy promotion about the city’s commitment to financial technology and other start-ups is only a shallow public relations campaign of the most cynical order.

Taxi drivers chase foreigner out of Uber taxi in Pattaya

Taxi drivers in Pattaya surrounded an Uber taxi on Wednesday afternoon and forced a western passenger out of the vehicle, the Uber driver said.

Thai Uber driver, Surasak Khukham, 29, filed a complaint with the Pattaya Police Station at 11pm.

He also played a video clip he had recorded when his car was surrounded by five or six taxis on Pattaya 2 Road in North Pattaya in the Bang Lamung district of Chon Buri province.

Surasak said the western tourist was terrified when the taxi was laid siege to.

Surasak was fined after the taxis surrounded his car and police turned up. His driving licence was seized.

Uber service is still illegal in Thailand.

SOUTH AFRICA: Woman On Uber Taxi Raped, Boyfriend Stabbed

Pietermaritzburg man and his girlfriend were left battered, bruised and traumatised after they were kidnapped and tortured in Johannesburg recently.

The attackers are believed to be a driver for well-known international taxi service Uber, and his accomplices.

However, Uber spokesperson Samantha Allenberg would not confirm that it was indeed a registered Uber driver involved in the attack, as the matter was still under police investigation.

The couple hailed an Uber taxi via the cellphone app in the early hours of August 28 after a night at a popular Johannesburg nightclub.

A close relative relayed how his niece and her boyfriend were kidnapped, stabbed and the woman raped during their eight-hour ordeal.

The Pietermaritzburg man lives and works at an insurance company in Gauteng while his partner, formerly from Durban, moved to Johannesburg just three weeks ago to take up a new job.

According to the relative, who asked not be named to protect the woman’s identity, his niece and her friends ordered three Uber taxis to take the group home, but the 26-year-old and her boyfriend were the only ones to share one taxi home at around 2.30 am.

“Everything was in place and pointed to the signs that it was a legitimate Uber taxi. They only noticed something was wrong when the driver passed the turn-off they were supposed to take,” said the uncle.

He said two men, who were hiding in the boot of the vehicle, pushed the back seats forward and stabbed the 26-year-old boyfriend before dragging the couple into the boot of the vehicle.

“They were then driven to an ATM in Tembisa, where she was forced to withdraw R3 000. However, she used her mother’s bank card and her mother was immediately alerted to the withdrawal via SMS,” he said.

The woman’s mother, who lives in Durban, immediately tried to contact her daughter and her boyfriend, but neither answered their cellphones.

“This was when her mother started contacting her daughter’s cousins and friends to see where she was. The friends who were at the club with them were already at home and began to worry,” he said.

Then began a frantic search for the couple by family and friends.

Meanwhile, the couple were blindfolded and their hands and feet bound with cable-ties, and driven to a house in Tembisa, a township north of Kempton Park, where they were held hostage.

They were only found by local residents around 11 am on the morning of August 28 after the couple managed to gain the attention of a child playing on the road.

“For eight hours, they were beaten and stabbed and my niece was raped. There were three men in the vehicle when the initial attack happened, but a fourth man joined them at the house during the morning,” the uncle said.

At the house, the brutality worsened when the Pietermaritzburg man failed to transfer a large sum of money to the kidnappers’ bank account, using one of their laptops.

“They were traumatised and brutally attacked for hours. It was only divine intervention that saved them,” the uncle said.

He said the man, bound by cable ties, managed to pull the curtain off its rails when they were left alone and saw the child playing on the road. It is believed the child alerted her family and the neighbours approached the house.

“When the men found out the community knew something was going on in the house, they fled. People in the community smashed the window and held their hands and kept telling them the police were on the way.

“The men had told them that they were going to kill them. When the community members smashed the window, the couple cried and asked them not to leave them there,” he said.

Police broke down the door and freed the couple. Their attackers are still at large.

Police spokesperson Captain Lefibana Molokomme said police were investigating a case of kidnapping and rape.

“There have been no arrests made as yet, but we are working around the clock to apprehend the suspects,” he said.

He urged anyone with information to contact the station at 011 391 1814.TAXI service Uber is accused of refusing to assist frantic family and friends to track down the whereabouts of the taxi the couple were abducted in.

Statement From Uber

The uncle of the young woman attacked said the couple’s friends contacted Uber via social media and the cellphone app, but the response only included a link to the company’s e-mail address as it does not have a call centre.

“Uber mentioned they were unable to provide details of the driver, his trips and refused to assist with contacting the driver of the Uber.

“Uber failed to respond on social media platforms to strong keywords being used such as hijack, kidnap etc,” read a post on the incident on Uber’s Facebook page.

The post has since been widely distributed on Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter and other social media platforms.

Some lashed out at the company, saying they would not use the taxi service any longer.

“As much as I use Uber for its convenience and ease of availability, whether or not this Uber was hijacked or not and/or the driver was involved or not, Uber chose not to assist whatsoever in locating the rider and chose not to assist in a critical situation without any alacrity that may have sped up the process of finding the couple, and in the most dire circumstance saved a life if the worst had to happen,” read the post.

UBER spokesperson Samantha Allenberg said she could not confirm if the attackers were registered Uber drivers, but added that the company was assisting police with their investigation.

She urged riders to check that their driver’s photo, name, vehicle and vehicle registration matched the details provided in the Uber app, before getting into the car.

The family was adamant that it was a registered Uber vehicle and that the driver and other details matched, Allenberg said she could not comment further.

She said while there had been a delayed response in assisting the couple’s family and friends in tracking down the vehicle, Uber’s incident response team had since contacted the couple and their families to offer support.

However, Uber said on its Facebook page that the information concerning the incident should have been escalated to the company’s head of trust and safety immediately upon receipt.

“While there is a privacy policy in place, a situation like this is most certainly one which should have been escalated immediately.

“The customer service representative did not follow our internal escalation processes and we will deal with this internally. Please know that we take matters like this extremely seriously and that we will be taking necessary action,” read the response from the Uber social media team.

Allenberg said they would continue to provide police with information “to support their efforts to bring whoever is responsible to justice”.

“This is a despicable crime and our first thoughts are with the victims and their families …” she said.

Beyond the driver screening processes, riders were also able to track all trips using GPS from beginning to end, and to share their estimated time of arrival and route with others, Allenberg said.

Uber Says Its Drivers Are Independent Contractors With Self-employed "freedom."

Switzerland has joined the chorus of disapproval against Uber's insistence that it's huge glove of drivers aren't employees—with the country's insurance agency saying that it must pay staff benefits to a man who challenged his employment status with the tap and ride firm.

The man is restricted from setting his own prices and payment terms in the Uber car he drives and faces consequences he if breaks the company's rules, found the Swiss accident insurance agency SUVA.

It comes not long after a similar UK ruling went against Uber during a tribunal hearing last October. The judgment said that Uber's 40,000 drivers in Britain are entitled to earn the national minimum wage, holiday pay, sick pay, and other benefits, after it heard from two individuals who had taken action against the company.

At the time, California-based Uber said it would appeal against the decision and told its drivers that it was—in effect—business as usual. "There will be no change to your partnership with Uber in light of this decision," it told them in an e-mail following the ruling, "and we will continue to support the overwhelming majority of drivers who tell us that they use the Uber app to be their own boss and choose when and where to drive."

In response to the latest ruling, Uber once again disputed the idea that its drivers should be treated as employees.

"Taxi dispatchers have had exactly this issue for years and yet today there is not one driver employed by a big dispatcher in cities such as Zurich or Geneva. So this is nothing new in Switzerland and we will challenge it, just as others have," said Uber general manager Rasoul Jalali.

He added: "Drivers using the Uber app are independent contractors who enjoy all the flexibility and freedom that come with being self-employed."

Uber has repeatedly faced questions around the globe about the "contractor" status that it pins on its army of drivers.

Uber, Uber, Uber, Welcome To Uganda The Land Of Boda Boda (Motor Cycle Taxis)

Uber will get a good reception from Ugandans fed up with confusion and unreliable drivers running Kampala's private car-hire industry.

How, i wish Uber joined the Boda Boda(motor cycle taxi)business instead.

It is the latest fascination in Kampala's hectic and hideous traffic-clogged system - the benefit of being nearly fully in control of your taxi service.

Uber, the new taxi company that launched recently, seeks to change a narrative that has for long defined private car hire services in the city - creating a sense of fairness and predictability.

It all starts with the power of the phone; from ordering a cab to monitoring how far it is to the fare you pay, Uber has it all. With Uber, it pays to have a smart phone. The first step is to download the app onto your phone.

The process will require your email and phone contacts. This process does not take more than five minutes, depending on your internet speeds of course. The Uber app is just 20 megabytes, which, in monetary terms, is less than Shs 500 on all mobile phone networks in Uganda.

When you are done downloading, then you are ready to order the cab.

Forget the painful phone calls you have to make to your local taxi guy to come pick you up, and the anxiety he puts you through when he says he is about to get to you and yet he is 30 or so minutes away. Then think about the hassle of bargaining with a taxi guy to drive you for a distance that ideally should be half the fee he is asking for.

Uber has just made that stress history.

However, Uber may soon have a fight with the undisciplined Boda Boda riders (Motor Cycle Taxis) over customers.

Expect fist fights like you have seen in India among taxi drivers.

Once the Uber app is downloaded, it establishes the location of the customer and driver using the Global Positioning System (GPS). Then it provides the option of whether the cab fare will be paid by credit card or cash.

After ordering the cab, an instant notification is sent to the phone showing the location of the driver, his name, car number plate, type of car, and the time it would take him to get to you. Pure efficiency.

Uber fees depend on the kilometres covered and the time spent waiting. He notes that they charge half of what other special-hire providers ask for. Extra costs are incurred in situations a passenger chooses the route with traffic jam or makes the driver wait.

"I ask you to choose an option; we use GPS or I use alternative routes. If you allow GPS and then there is traffic jam on the route you have chosen, then we charge you a waiting fee, you are not charged if you allow the driver to choose the routes," he says.

At least Shs 200 is charged per minute for delays, waiting and traffic jam. Shs 900 is charged for every kilometre travelled and Shs 1,300 is the base fee.

For one to make it as a Uber driver, he must have undergone defensive driving training, be fluent in English and must have gone through a background check, which is done by the International Police (Interpol).

Uber works with law enforcement organisations and helps them gather evidence in cases of complaints from clients.

INDONESIA: Uber Obtains Government Approval To Do Buisiness In Jakarta

Uber Technologies Inc said on Tuesday it had received the green light from the Jakarta governor to operate in the Indonesian capital after giving assurances that it would comply with local tax rules and other requirements.

Jakarta police had earlier this year deemed the US car-hailing service illegal, saying its drivers did not pay the correct taxes and the company did not have the license needed to operate as a form of public transport.

In a statement, Uber said it is working with the office of the city’s governor, Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama, and Indonesia’s investment coordinating board to establish itself as a legal entity in Indonesia, pay taxes, have adequate insurance and ensure its “partner vehicles” undergo regular inspection.

“Previously there was tremendous regulatory ambiguity,” Uber spokesman Karun Arya said in an email.

“Governor Ahok has now provided clear direction for Uber in terms of specific requirements for Uber and other ride sharing platforms to operate and thrive in Jakarta.”

Uber has registered with Indonesia’s investment coordinating board as a technology or web company, Arya added.

There was no immediate comment from the Jakarta governor’s office.

Privately owned Uber has grown aggressively worldwide with its matchmaker service for drivers and passengers, but a lack of regulation for the relatively new business model has brought it to the attention of authorities.

The company is also facing stiff competition from rivals US-based Lyft, China’s Didi Kuaidi, Southeast Asia’s GrabTaxi and India’s Ola, which recently formed a global ride-sharing partnership.

In Indonesia, Uber currently operates in Bali, Bandung and Jakarta, a city notorious for its traffic congestion and lack of public transport.

In an email, Uber said it planned to expand to more cities in Southeast Asia’s largest economy next year, and would boost the number of its drivers to 100,000 by 2017 from more than 12,000 currently.