Uber Safety

You can fingerprint, but that won't stop the occasional rape/sexual assult from someone with a clean record, or someone pretending to be an Uber driver.

The state does conduct backround checks.
 
I've heard too many bad things about Uber!! They should be shut down & their license to operate yanked away!!!

Lyft is no better!! Someone once fraudulently charged my debit card for their services!! I had the card yanked out of service & a new one issued to me!! And the charges reimbursed!!

I've cut off their air supply!! Hah!! :mad:
 
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The fact of life is bad people will continue to exist and avoid authorities. The same people who become Uber drivers could just as easily become taxi drivers, they all get background checks but background checks only work if they've already done something wrong. Taxi unions are just pushing the narrative that Uber drivers are inherently worse people. Think it goes the same as anything else, be sensible, be aware of your surroundings and assume the worst in people. Anyone in a clear state of mind could call 911 before something bad happened in an Uber, three taps on my lock button or my smartwatch does it on my phone. If you're highly inebriated then you should go home with a friend. Even in the age of Uber it's sensible to designate a friend as a designated "driver" even if their only job is to make sure you get home safe and not drive at all. Statistically speaking, I would saying being in an Uber is probably safer than walking, but less safe than a bus or subway. You're inherently putting yourself in a situation when you enter a closed space with one stranger, taxi driver or Uber driver.

tldr; taxi drivers have the same problem, it just doesn't necessarily catch media attention the same way. google taxi driver

https://www.google.com/search?q=taxi+driver+rape&client=ms-android-samsung-ss&prmd=nvi&source=lnms&tbm=nws&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiQt5a8j6vhAhWtct8KHTSiCBcQ_AUoAXoECAsQAQ&biw=412&bih=766&dpr=3.5
 
Uber/Lyft drivers who assault passengers are also pretty much 100% certain to be caught. Their identities are recorded and verified and their acts are tracked on GPS in real time and saved to the cloud. The same goes for passengers who assault drivers.

The same cannot be said for acts committed in just about any other venue.
 
These rapes are not about Uber vs taxi or background checks or regulations. Predators use any means available to attack women. These Uber rapists were previously the sleezebags who picked up drunk women at the bar to rape them. Ride ailing apps should do everything possible to protect their passengers, but comparison to the old taxi system is a pointless distraction. They need to be forward thinking to be effective in protecting women.
 
JumboBuc said:
Uber/Lyft drivers who assault passengers are also pretty much 100% certain to be caught.
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Sadly, I am willing to bet that there are numerous instances of women being assaulted in Ubers/Lyfts who never report it for a variety of reasons.
 
BosDevelop said:
Sadly, I am willing to bet that there are numerous instances of women being assaulted in Ubers/Lyfts who never report it for a variety of reasons.
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Let me fix that for you: Sadly, I am willing to bet that there are numerous instances of women being assaulted who never report it for a variety of reasons.

That's a separate issue that is far bigger and more widespread and needs to be tackled outside of the transportation industry. Beyond TNCs installing cameras and panic buttons in all cars, I can't think of many ways that TNCs can increase sexual assault reporting. As I said, that's a much bigger issue.
 
Uber is supposed to feature that in one of their car windows as well.
 
Jahvon09 said:
Uber is supposed to feature that in one of their car windows as well.
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Well licence plates are lit up on every car, and your app has the licence plate when you're matched with a driver.
 
Hey, maybe let's stay away from victim-blaming here. You can't maintain both that this is a pervasive social problem and that it would be solved by simply checking a license plate. The penalty for making an honest mistake isn't death. This has happened both with actual drivers who cleared background checks and with predators posing as drivers.

Are there common-sense things we can all do to try and stay safe? Yes, but those are distinct from the main thing, which is 'stop men from assaulting women.'
 
cadetcarl said:
Hey, maybe let's stay away from victim-blaming here. You can't maintain both that this is a pervasive social problem and that it would be solved by simply checking a license plate. The penalty for making an honest mistake isn't death. This has happened both with actual drivers who cleared background checks and with predators posing as drivers.

Are there common-sense things we can all do to try and stay safe? Yes, but those are distinct from the main thing, which is 'stop men from assaulting women.'
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Thanks. I spent about 10 minutes trying to draft a similar response, but couldn't quite find the words.

I've had multiple people walk up to my car and try to open the doors (thankfully, my car doors automatically lock when it's in drive) because my car looked similar to their Uber/Lyft. My friend drives a gray Corolla. He gets mistaken for an Uber/Lyft quite frequently. None of those people deserve to die, and there are easy steps rideshares and authorities could take to improve safety (making visible, illuminated branding mandatory would be one of those steps) and cut down on mistakes
 
The problem of people getting into unlicensed or unchecked cars is not a new concept. Gypsy cabs have existed for a long time.

How to fix it, well they could run the transit system for 24 hours (could be via night buses) so people don't have to use Ubers to get home.
 
Or they can easily fix that mistake by adding a feature that requires both the passenger and the uber driver, upon the uber's arrival, to hit a "correct driver/passenger" confirm button before the ride can start. It would have prevented this case because the driver would have never hit the confirm and the passenger will be notified that she is not getting in the correct car.
 
KentXie said:
Or they can easily fix that mistake by adding a feature that requires both the passenger and the uber driver, upon the uber's arrival, to hit a "correct driver/passenger" confirm button before the ride can start. It would have prevented this case because the driver would have never hit the confirm and the passenger will be notified that she is not getting in the correct car.
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The driver already must press a "start trip" button, but the passenger doesn't confirm. I suspect this is in part to allow people to order Ubers/Lyfts for others, in which case the "passenger's" phone is not actually on the actual person in the car.

But beside that, if a passenger gets in a random car and goes along with a random driver without noticing that they aren't in their actual Uber/Lyft, I doubt that a confirmation on their phone is going to make a difference.
 
JumboBuc said:
The driver already must press a "start trip" button, but the passenger doesn't confirm. I suspect this is in part to allow people to order Ubers/Lyfts for others, in which case the "passenger's" phone is not actually on the actual person in the car.

But beside that, if a passenger gets in a random car and goes along with a random driver without noticing that they aren't in their actual Uber/Lyft, I doubt that a confirmation on their phone is going to make a difference.
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Yep this, generally speaking they aren't in the right state of mind to notice. The original Uber driver will probably call you to ask where you are if you get in another person's car and eventually will cancel the ride, all of which will notify you.
 
KentXie said:
Or they can easily fix that mistake by adding a feature that requires both the passenger and the uber driver, upon the uber's arrival, to hit a "correct driver/passenger" confirm button before the ride can start. It would have prevented this case because the driver would have never hit the confirm and the passenger will be notified that she is not getting in the correct car.
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Beyond the objections already offered, how does that help? That only makes things marginally safer in that it might train people in general, but that doesn't help with any specific scenario. If they get in a car that isn't an Uber, at that point, its already too late. Obviously, any nutjob that is doing stuff like this that isn't an Uber driver is not going to have any of the safety features implemented.

And how would it be implemented? You'd have to somehow give the Uber app control over the door locks in order to make this workable. Otherwise, the passenger could get in before these safety checks go into effect.

tysmith95 said:
The problem of people getting into unlicensed or unchecked cars is not a new concept. Gypsy cabs have existed for a long time.

How to fix it, well they could run the transit system for 24 hours (could be via night buses) so people don't have to use Ubers to get home.
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Can't run busses everywhere. Even in an urban environment, you can't have them running down every single street to every bar and every house. Nor can you run them at the same frequency as an uber can be hailed.
 
cadetcarl said:
The penalty for making an honest mistake isn't death.
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That's not always true. Honest mistakes have caused countless plane crashes (orhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenerife_airport_disaster), train crashes, car crashes, bike crashes, pedestrians being run over etc and killed millions of people. I've watched someone make the honest mistake of riding a bike out across a road after stopping looking for cars coming and get hit by a car going 45 mph, they made the honest mistake of not seeing the oncoming car in the low sunlight shining into their eyes but ya know that doesn't change the car coming at them at 45mph... Honest mistakes can definitely end in death, not as a penalty but as a result of a mistake you made definitely.
 
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