Taxi Apps Accused of Facilitating Sexual Harassment In Brazil

New submitter André Costa writes The companies responsible for taxi apps Easy Taxi and 99Taxis are being accused of making it too easy for taxi drivers to harass female customers (some news reports — in Portuguese — can be found here, here and here). These apps currently disclose informations such as the client's name, cell phone and address to the driver. One customer that started being harassed through offensive text messages after a ride started an online petition demanding that the companies take effective measures to protect female customers. The petition already collected more than 27,000 signatures, and both Easy Taxi and 99Taxis already announced that they will implement features that will protect clients' privacy. At first, users will be allowed to choose if they want their phone numbers to be disclosed. Within a couple of months, both companies said they will provide VOIP calls, which will eliminate the need to exchange phone numbers.

Comments

UBER

[Anonymous Coward]

Here we go...

This is why I always use Uber

[Anonymous Coward]

Uber is the only safe choice, really. I've got dozens of friends with horror stories about old fashioned Taxi drivers that attacked them or stole their phones or spat in their faces and one who was raped at gunpoint. I can't even say how many times I struggled to understand what that Taxi driver was even saying. LEARN ENGLISH, DUDE!

For me, Uber is the best choice because only Uber guarantees my safety and the low prices and easy availability are just bonuses!

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[YrWrstNtmr]

So says the Uber shill.

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[ganjadude]

i havent taken UBER before, but haven taken taxis before, i honestly cant see how it can be worse. They quote you a price and try and charge you more, they never speak english, its a giant hassle

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[invictusvoyd]

What I dont understand is , whats the big deal about uber? why is everyone giving it so much publicity? AFAIK its just another fucked up service .. what the hell..

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[ShanghaiBill]

What I dont understand is , whats the big deal about uber?

I am not really "pro-Uber", but I am anti-corrupt-government-monopolies, and the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[invictusvoyd]

Thats what the americans said to the Taliban . They werent really pro-islamic

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[Anonymous Coward]

They quote you a price and try and charge you more

Uber does the same. I once had my uber driver get stuck in traffic, pull an illegal uturn to find a "faster" way, and end up getting stuck even worse. I had to pay an extra $30 over what I was expecting. At least with a normal cab driver you can try to argue. With Uber, they've already got your credit card on file. The only thing you could try would be a charge back, and good fucking luck winning that one.

Re: This is why I always use Uber

[Anonymous Coward]

Fool.

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[TapeCutter]

Do you still get your 50 cent astroturf fee when you post AC?

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[TapeCutter]

They quote you a price and try and charge you more

I drove cabs for 3yrs, never, ever, gave "quotes", I gave estimates but made it clear you were on the meter since half of what was on the meter wasn't mine to give away in the first place. Very rarely someone would give you a big bill to drive their elderly mum home, in those cases the meter wasn't switched on ;)

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[Anonymous Coward]

and the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Perhaps this is stating what should be obvious, but the enemy of my enemy can be my tool. No more and no less. The enemy of my enemy is certainly not ipso facto my friend, or indeed anything other than my enemy's enemy.

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[Applehu Akbar]

"What I dont understand is , whats the big deal about uber? why is everyone giving it so much publicity? "

Vast press coverage accorded to a service that most people would need about once a year. Such is the scorn of rent-seekers whose gummint granted monopoly is threatened.

What I really want to see is for the Uber concept to be applied to health care. That's when the news will get really interesting.

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[ColdWetDog]

What I really want to see is for the Uber concept to be applied to health care. That's when the news will get really interesting.

What, people will make an appointment to get a physical in the back of somebody else's car? Where does that get fun?

Re:This is why I always use Uber

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on now, Taxis are slightly better than the Taliban! You almost never get stabbed or beheaded by smelly and insane no-speak-english muslim Taxi drivers.

In Soviet Russia

[Anonymous Coward]

Client sexually abuse you!

Re: In Soviet Russia

[Anonymous Coward]

Either way , gay sex is forbidden. Fucking your mom isnt

Re: In Soviet Russia

[Anonymous Coward]

hey u rusky? or kusky hsudjeiurh de hsiui oi hfjduierj got it?

Re: In Soviet Russia

[Anonymous Coward]

his mom is a tranny you insensitive clod.

Why not transfer phone calls?

[Anonymous Coward]

The driver calls a company number, which connects him to the customer he needs to reach. The driver never needs to know the customer phone number. To prevent harassment, the call transfer no longer works a few hours after the trip.

Sounds like

[burtosis]

They have an uber problem on their hands. She should have a right to be lyft alone.

Re:Sounds like

[Anonymous Coward]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaWemPhcEwI

Ban women from using taxi apps

[Karmashock]

I'm fucking tired of this shit. Dudes deal with seedy bullshit all the time but the ladies want to be in little isolated soap bubbles.

Just enough. Another idea might be requiring that women passengers use female taxi drivers. Will that mean paying significantly more for a taxi? I can't control the market value. Maybe it will be an empowering experience and the female drivers will get a good financial opportunity. Who knows.

But really, this whole ongoing whine has become tiresome. If you want to use a normal yellow cab, then use one of those. If you want to use the the rape mobiles which is apparently character assassination being tried against Uber etc... then you know what you were getting in for.

Seriously done with it. No woman HAS to use an Uber cab. They can use a yellow cab or whatever was there before Uber. Use that, climb into the back of some grimy cab that smells like stale cigarette smoke driven in all likelihood by some hairy guy that is OF COURSE never going to rape you or make inappropriate comments. He isn't working for Uber, so he's safe.

And then enjoy your rape free environment. But if you use the Uber cab... I don't want to hear about it. I'm tapped out of care.

Re:Ban women from using taxi apps

[burtosis]

I know no one reads the article, or often even the summary but these are regular 'yellow' taxis. The only difference is the cabbies got more than the usual amount of client information.

Re:Ban women from using taxi apps

[Karmashock]

I was aware... but it is all linked to the general backlash against changes to the taxi system which is linked to Uber etc.

This isn't happening in a vacuum. Should a taxi driver see your phone number? The taxi dispatch operator has your phone number.

How is it better for that to happen? The dispatch operator also knows where you were picked up and where you were dropped off.

No one minds the dispatch operator having that information but the taxi driver? No... that's a violation of my privacy. Give me a fucking break.

If THAT concerns you then you must just go through every day convinced you're going to get raped by anyone. And if that is your attitude, then get a gun or learn kung fu or something. Just deal with it.

There was a prominent lesbian that dressed as man for few months to learn what it is like to be a man. What she noticed was that men actually deal with more actual threats of violence than women on a regular basis. They just deal with it differently. Men go through situations all the time where they know if they do the wrong thing they're going to get the shit beaten out of them, robbed, or killed.

This is the 21st century. I think we're past the point where women expect to be protected from the realities of the world in general.

Men defend themselves. And no, they don't do it with raw physical power... most guys aren't strong enough in any case. And a surprise attack is very hard to deal with in general. They deal with it by not being a target.

It isn't about victim blaming. It is about not being a victim. You don't show weakness. You do not provoke attack. You do not do stupid shit.

It isn't rocket science. Again... 21st century. It is only getting hairier from here on in.

Re:Ban women from using taxi apps

[alzoron]

According to the summary the problem is already being solved. I'm not quite sure what the point of this article is.

Re:Ban women from using taxi apps

[machodude]

An application leaking your name, home address and phone number -- without making it obvious to you that it does so -- would've caused a shitstorm on /. a few years ago, and rightfully so.

Dudes deal with seedy bullshit all the time

Exactly, and that's why these ladies did everyone a favor by protesting so it got fixed. Your red-pill addled mind got so hung up on the word "female" that you missed the rest of the sentence: "making it too easy for taxi drivers to harass [...] customers". Not only have there been leaks, there have been actual cases of customers -- humans -- harassed. It's beyond theoretical at this point, it isn't just whining for the sake of whining.

They can use a yellow cab or whatever was there before Uber. Use that, climb into the back of some grimy cab that smells like stale cigarette smoke driven in all likelihood by some hairy guy that is OF COURSE never going to rape you or make inappropriate comments.

Yellow cabs are using these apps now. So not only are you that unsafe environment, that "hairy guy" has your home adress and phone number.

And then enjoy your rape free environment.

There's no reason to be sarcastic about trying avoid being raped. Rape is problematic for guys too, in prison for example.

Re:Ban women from using taxi apps

[CrimsonAvenger]

I confess to not reading TFA, though I did read TFS. I fail to see how the cabbie can get LESS information than specified in TFS - he needs to know your name in order to identify his passenger, cellphone number is displayed whenever someone calls me (and I'm not even a cabdriver), and home address is (more likely than not) where you're being picked up OR where you're being dropped off....

Re:Ban women from using taxi apps

[Karmashock]

The taxi company always knows these things.

And it only knows your name because you TELL it your name.

If it asks my name and I say "bruce wayne" then the taxi company thinks my name is bruce wayne. Same thing with everything else.

It isn't a big deal because the taxi companies have been getting this information since ALWAYS. The only difference is that they're trying to remove the dispatchers which means the driver gets it instead of the dispatcher. Why is that problem?

As to taxi drivers harassing customers... you give you information to people every day. How often do you get harassed by any of them?

And again, the taxi company is not getting any information that they weren't getting anyway.

As to there being no need to joke about rape, I disagree. Rape is a crime and I don't support it at all but the campaigns have gotten absurdly sanctimonious on the issue. A-fucking-nough.

Dudes get murdered in the street every day and there's no national campaign to stop that despite their brains getting blown out.

Put your bullshit in perspective. "This" is bullshit.

now this is new

[Anonymous Coward]

Just yesterday /. was telling me how awesome taxi drivers are vetted against uber drivers despite all signs pointing the other way:
http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=7127477&cid=49296375

Color me surprised.

Re:now this is new

[TapeCutter]

When I went for my taxi license back in the 80's it was;
1. Pee in a cup. 2. Find an address in a street directory. 3. Calculate a split fare. 4. Memorise a handful of regulations, must display license, what to do if customer refuses to pay, etc.

Shit job, shit pay, but if driving a cab doesn't teach you how to handle random arseholes, nothing will.

despite all signs pointing the other way

If you read the statistical "signs" they all say the cab driver is in far more peril than the passenger.

Not a fix either...

[s.petry]

Taxi apps are a method of communications. ALL methods of communication can be used for bad things as easy as they can be used for good things. Blaming a "taxi" application is idiotic, because the same claim could be made of Facebook, Twitter, email, cell phones, or even a goddamn piece of paper and pen if that is the only method of communication handy.

People collude and plot. This is not some brand new revelation, it goes back thousands of years in historical writing. Read Homer, Plato, Aristotle, all of the diaries from the dark ages. More recently, watch just about any reality TV show which is always full of people plotting and scheming. Someone is always a victim, and someone always benefits. Losing your life savings on paper may be deemed "not as bad" as an assault, but the long reaching impact is worse in my opinion.

We can't teach history, and we can't talk about reality. We half to talk about invented dramas which have no bearing on reality except to maintain the status quo.

It's really too bad that people refuse to look at why people get paid big bucks to argue and publish these positions. Remember, Gamergate was an issue about sexism, not about corrupt journalists colluding to influence public opinion. (hint: One of those things is reality, the other is an invented scenario)

Re:Not a fix either...

[Karmashock]

Exactly. I'm just tired of bullshit. Once you've taken the red pill you see the corruption and patterns of behavior everywhere.

It isn't even always a conspiracy. It moves like a fad or a meme... it is the wave that goes around a stadium. A mindless and generally meaningless reaction that forms a pattern of behavior.

This whole "uber causes rape" meme has been flowing around the world. And YES I know this article is not about Uber... but it is a result of that meme.

The point of the apps is to bypass the dispatch operators and permit taxi drivers to interact directly with passengers prior to pick up. There's nothing wrong with that. The Taxi driver also already knew where he was picking you up and where he was dropping you off. If they wanted to stock you then they could have done that since always. The only thing they're getting now that they didn't have before is your phone number. OH NOES.

If they really need to fix this issue, worst case they can route all call through some third party phone call anonymizing agent that associates a each passenger and taxi driver with some ID code in the system. Passenger calls the automated dispatch, types in a 4 digit driver ID code and the call is forwarded to the taxi driver. Taxi driver calls the automated dispatch and dials the temporary 4 digit ID code and the call is forwarded to the passenger. The programming for something like that is trivial. There is probably an off the shelf option available that could be set up in an afternoon to do it.

If you really need to fix it... then take a day and do that. I'm just tired of the "taxi app causes rape" meme flowing around. It's fucking bullshit.

Re: Not a fix either...

[Anonymous Coward]

Your post raped me. Police!!!

Re:Not a fix either...

[Anonymous Coward]

> ALL methods of communication can be used for bad things as easy as they can be used for good things

And.. erroneous premise, 5 yard penalty!!!

Sexting pictures from children's bathrooms is a form of communications. Can that be used as easily for good things as for bad things? Survey says.... BZZZT!!!!

You know what? This never used to be a problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Back in the old days before "wimyns studies 101" and the rise of the victim complex.

Maybe these chicks need to put on their big girl panties and suck it, like their mothers before them.

Re:You know what? This never used to be a problem

[sumdumass]

This isn't about big girl panties or sucking it. It's about a transaction and the details of which being used for nonprofessional uses.

It's like you getting a phone and then all the sudden getting obscene and harassing phone calls from the phone company itself and it's employees stalking you. Anyone should enjoy the right to not be pestered by indecent calls or texts just because they did business with someone.

Re:You know what? This never used to be a problem

[Anonymous Coward]

You sure live up to your username, that's for sure! If you don't want the attention, don't put yourself out there, have your husband or father drive you places instead of whoring around town alone. If modern women had half the modesty of their mothers, 99% of rapes wouldn't happen. If you don't believe me look at rape statistics from the 1940s and 1950s compared to now.

Re:You know what? This never used to be a problem

[sumdumass]

lol.. What an idiot. Whether a woman looks like a whore or not does not give anyone the right to violate her just as it doesn't give anyone the right to kick your ass- even though we might think you deserve it. When she says bugger off creep, you need to move on.

Rape statistics have little to do with it. For one, a lot of the rapes were unreported, for two, there was a level of social justice the simply is not tolerated today so rapists don't really have to worry about being hunted down a killed by her kin, three, in the 50s and 60s we institutionalize mentally ill people a lot earlier and a lot longer on a lot less grounds, and finally, and finally, we changed the laws on what was rape in the 60's including the reporting for record keeping to include more acts and again later in the 70s and 80s to include yet more activities.

If you look at the statistics which only include what was reported, you will see a jump in all violent, property, rape, robbery, assault, burglary and, motor vehicle theft crimes too. It seems the murder and larceny rates stayed about the same. Is that all because of how a woman started dressing or could there be other issues involved?

but hey, this has nothing to do with rapes as near as I can tell. None of the articles listed mention it. It is literally as I said, professional disclosure of personal information being used for non professional uses and behavior that would get most people fired from their jobs.

Re:You know what? This never used to be a problem

[Anonymous Coward]

An alternate and more appropriate way to look at it is that before Hanoi Fonda and her ilk started to burn their bras, women were made of stronger stuff and were capable of brushing off annoyances that make current women reach for the trigger warnings. Now with the "male gaze" and other such feminitwaddle even the act of looking at a girl is considered "rape". No wonder there's "more occurances" now.

Back in the day women were more moral, dressed appropriately and used common sense to stay out of dangerous situations. Women now days want the right to make dumb choices and have someone else pay the price (along with the price of their contraceptives, isn't that right miss fluke?).

That's what feminism has made of woman; stupider than her predecessors and far whinier. We won't even talk about what it's done to the men! Those poor fools are queing up to have their balls cut off -god help us all!

Re:You know what? This never used to be a problem

[sumdumass]

I agree that feminist have went beyond equality into some I'm special silly reality but this simply is not part of it.

Someone saying nice legs, whistling, and crap is something that should be blown off. However, that object of the cat call should have the ability to retreat if they are not comfortable. Because these apps shared personal information with specific business transactions, that personal information should not be used to remove portions of that retreat. A cab driver giving a wolf whistle is one thing, borderline stalking by repeatedly communicating the same but through other avenues only possible because of that business transaction is completely another.

Look at it this way, if your mom, sister, girlfriend, you neighbor or even yourself dressed as prudish as you think women should, acted like you think they should, and her bank keeps calling her to say he wishes he was her undergarment or messages her to talk about his sexual quirks and keeps asking to meet up- would you think it was appropriate? I would hope not and I would hope you would expect it to stop. Now if the same was walking down the street and people said the same, it would be different if it ended when they walked away.

Re:You know what? This never used to be a problem

[ColdWetDog]

Grandpa! What are you doing posting on Slashdot?

Re:You know what? This never used to be a problem

[Anonymous Coward]

> Someone saying nice legs, whistling, and crap is something that should be blown off.

Like the 13 year old I met last night, *incensed* that the symbol for Volvo has an arrow on it. "That's Sexist!! Grrrr, argghhh!!!"

I very, very carefully did not mention that I had *just* bought her a box of tampons, which might have something to do with her reaction, and I *definitely* did not dare mention that to her mother.

Such type of apps should be avoided

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah this type of things are prevailing in all types of areas...............
Comment from http://Techstext.com

Should sexist male devs be banned from opensource?

[Anonymous Coward]

This story about sexual harrasment using phone apps brings up another question relevant to linux and FLOSS: Should sexist opensource developers have their projects censored or removed?

Recently an opensource game release story was removed due to the game developer's open sexism(0) and harrasment(1) of women in tech.

A story posted by the editor of the popular Phoronix linux news site about a release of an Open Source videogame was later manually removed(2). The reason cited was the game developer's unacceptable views on social issues such as gender equality (3).

The release story was titled "Xonotic-Forked ChaosEsqueAnthology Sees New Release - Phoronix" and can be accessed via the google cache(4).

With the recent inclusion of a code of conduct(5) for those wishing to contribute to the Linux Kernel some questions now need to be asked and answered about the inclusion of code from people who are known to engage in or promote socially unacceptable attitudes or harrasments of those whom the free-software movement would prefer to attract in their place:

* Are the social or political views of an author of free software relevant to that software's inherent quality?
* Should the beliefs of an opensource developer weigh when when evaluating whether a piece of opensource software is worthy of any publicity or public notice?
* Should men with unpopular or "forbidden" views be excised from the opensource movement and "not allowed" to contribute, in a manner similar to that which is done in employment?
* Has the free/opensource software movement changed in these respects since its founding? If so is this a positive change?
* Should there be gatekeepers to opensource that decide who may and who may not contribute. Should abusive developers be "blackballed" to maintain proper social order and controls?

and

* What are the consequences of not doing this

Citations:
(0) Past related incident: http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1310
(1) http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/...
(2) Removed story URL: http://www.phoronix.com/scan.p...
(3) http://www.phoronix.com/forums...
"Fortunately, the article has been removed now."
"Thanks everybody for speaking up."
(4) https://webcache.googleusercon...
(5) Linux "Code of Conflict"

Re:Should sexist male devs be banned from opensour

[Anonymous Coward]

Absolutely yes, they should; along with anti-semetic and racist devs.

Re:Should sexist male devs be banned from opensour

[Anonymous Coward]

Why should you have the right to do this?

In the past, before the women moved in, all that mattered was the code.
Honestly, I think people like you, who can't leave men alone to their hobbies, will have to be killed to stop you.
You never let up. Thus killing is the only response.

Sexual harassment is now a crime in Brazil?

[Applehu Akbar]

Uber is responsible to global warming and the heartbreak of psoriasis in 3...2...1.

Basic logic fail

[s.petry]

Sending an image is communicating. Sending a specific type of image is using that method of communication. Without failed logic can you prove my statement wrong regarding communication? Call me a skeptic, but you already failed at basic logic so I believe the answer is "NO".