Uber to end post-trip tracking of riders
as part of privacy push
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[August 29, 2017]
By Dustin Volz
PALO ALTO, Calif. (Reuters) - Uber
Technologies Inc is pulling a heavily criticized feature from its app
that allowed it to track riders for up to five minutes after a trip, its
security chief told Reuters, as the ride-services company tries to fix
its poor reputation for customer privacy.
The change, which restores users' ability to share location data only
while using the app, is expected to be announced on Tuesday and rolled
out to Apple Inc iPhone users starting this week. It comes as Uber tries
to recover from a series of crises culminating in the ouster of Chief
Executive Travis Kalanick and other top executives.
Dara Khosrowshahi, the CEO of travel-booking company Expedia Inc is set
to become Uber's new chief executive, sources have told Reuters.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2017/Aug/29/images/ads/current/topflight_west_sda_101414.png)
The location-tracking update is unrelated to executive changes, said Joe
Sullivan, Uber’s chief security officer, in an interview with Reuters.
Sullivan and his team of about 500 have been working to beef up customer
privacy at Uber since he joined in 2015.
"We’ve been building through the turmoil and challenges because we
already had our mandate," said Sullivan, who is a member of the
executive leadership team that has been co-running Uber since Kalanick
left in June.
An update to the app made last November eliminated the option for users
to limit data gathering to only when the app is in use, instead forcing
them to choose between letting Uber always collect location data or
never collect it.
Uber said it needed permission to always gather data in order to track
riders for five minutes after a trip was completed, which the company
believed could help in ensuring customers' physical safety. The option
to never track required riders to manually enter pickup and drop-off
addresses.
But the changes were met with swift criticism by some users and privacy
advocates who called them a breach of user trust by a company already
under fire for how it collects and uses customers' data. Uber said it
never actually began post-trip tracking for iPhone users and suspended
it for Android users.
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An Uber sign is seen in a car in New York, U.S. June 30, 2015.
REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz/File Photo
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Sullivan said Uber made a mistake by asking for more information
from users without making clear what value Uber would offer in
return. If Uber decides that tracking a rider’s location for five
minutes is valuable in the future, it will seek to explain what the
value is and allow customers to opt in to the setting, he said.
Sullivan said Uber was committed to privacy but had previously
suffered "a lack of expertise" in the area.
The change comes two weeks after Uber settled a U.S. Federal Trade
Commission complaint that the company failed to protect the personal
information of drivers and passengers and was deceptive about its
efforts to prevent snooping by its employees.
Uber agreed to conduct an audit every two years for the next 20
years to ensure compliance with FTC requirements.
The location-tracking changes will initially only be available to
iPhone users, but Uber intends to bring parity to Android devices,
Sullivan said.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2017/Aug/29/images/ads/current/graue_17_cruze_080717.png)
The changes are part of a series of updates expected in the coming
year to improve privacy, security and transparency at Uber, Sullivan
said.
(Reporting by Dustin Volz; Editing by Jonathan Weber and Bill Rigby)
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