Uber Revises Privacy Policy, Wants More Data From Users

itwbennett tips news that Uber has amended its privacy policy, making it much simpler to read and understand. But the policy also includes changes to what data Uber collects about its riders. Beginning July 15th, the Uber phone app will keep track of a rider's location while it's running in the background. Uber says riders will be able to opt out of this tracking. The policy changes also allow for advertising using the rider's contact list: "for example the ability to send special offers to riders' friends or family." The revision of Uber's privacy policy followed complaints at the end of last year that the company was overstepping its bounds.

Comments

Uber should start using

[Megaweapon]

adware-infested installers, perhaps hosted on SourceForge, which could also track customers.

Re: Uber should start using

[Anonymous Coward]

Does this also include the uber app that at&t pushed onto my phone as a non removable system app? There are NO UBER DRIVERS in upstate, backwoods New York

WTF?

[gstoddart]

The policy changes also allow for advertising using the rider's contact list: "for example the ability to send special offers to riders' friends or family."

Wait, you think a user can give you permission to spam their friends and family?

How about go fuck yourself and not assuming that because you know Bob, you can scrape his contact list to spam Alice and Mary ... that screams of an epic level of ass-hattery. Because Bob can't legally give you permission to spam Alice and Mary.

Sounds like in addition to being just a dispatcher for illegal cabs, Uber is also a bunch of self entitled assholes who want to spam your friends.

Fuck you, Uber.

Re:WTF?

[dunkindave]

Wait, you think a user can give you permission to spam their friends and family?

Someone at Uber has been studying the LinkedIn business plan.

Re:WTF?

[gstoddart]

This is quite honestly why I'm getting away from apps.

Generally, the web page works just fine from mobile, and you don't need to worry about the shit they're doing behind the scenes.

This whole "oh, just give us access to your contact list and we'll spam them" is crap. Same for things which say "hey, just give us your email password and we'll load your contacts".

How about piss off, and keep your hands off my private information.

Someone needs to start pelting the owners of Uber with eggs. Because this screams of greedy assholes deciding they get to have access to your entire phone.

In which case they deserve to die as a company as fast as possible.

If someone didn't explicitly opt-in to receive stuff from you, you have no business sending them stuff. In fact, isn't it illegal?

Re:WTF?

[neminem]

No, they should start spamming the *friends and family* of the owners of Uber with eggs. After all, clearly they opted in to such treatment by being related to or friends of the people who did this, right?

Re:WTF?

[gstoddart]

And, of course, since they've given themselves permission to share with 3rd parties (again, to make themselves money) ... then they've also give permission to doxx them and their families.

Everything about this screams "greedy assholes trying to leverage your personal information for profit while loudly saying taxi regulations don't apply"

The more I hear about Uber, the harder is is to think this isn't a purely criminal enterprise.

Let's see, you want to do location tracking of everybody with your app, and you want access to their private information, and you claim the right to pass that on to 3rd parties ... yeah, no.

How about drop dead you greedy bastards?

Re:WTF?

[TheGratefulNet]

100%. this is why I refuse to install 'apps' and I really use my smartphone to just check email, run gps and sometimes use voice to make calls. most of a smart phone is wasted on me since I'm not a typical teen or 20someething who 'buys into' the whole shebang, lack of privacy and all.

android is not really trustable, carriers are a joke for trust, app writers tend to abuse their position and write crap or malicious code and the whole thing is a steaming pile of shit.

the smart phone thing had a lot of potential but I see that we have ruined this medium and device just like the 'business guys' have totally ruined the web and the internet as a whole.

now, I had nothing against uber before hearing this; but now, I won't be caught dead inside one of their cars, now. this 'war on your customers' is nothing I care to help fund or support!

uber can go fuck off. they don't exist to me, given this stance of theirs.

(and now I'm starting to have 2nd thoughts about having ANY 'contacts' in my contact list. again, phones cannot be trusted and apps, even less. best way to not have your friends spammed is, I guess, just to NOT even populate the contact list! seriously - might just return to flip phones and call it a century..)

Re:WTF?

[oldmac31310]

I seem to have been using it for the wrong reasons.

Sample mailing

[sinij]

Dear Bob's Wife,

Based on Bob's Uber profile statistics we have determined that he took 7 after-hours rides to the red light district during recent months. Please find attached 10% discount coupon for a ride to lawyer's office.

Sincerely,
Uber's Customer Retention Team.

Re:Well there we go

[gstoddart]

You drive for Yellow Cab, eh?

You're completely fucking stupid, eh?

Look, whatever libertarian fantasy world you live in which says a company gets to ignore regulations because their asshole business model says they're special is full of shit. In fact, it's downright delusional. "Boo hoo, teh regulations are teh evil. Horseshit.

Uber like to paint themselves as some crusading underdog being oppressed by the taxi lobby -- but that;'s a crock of shit.

They're a company dispatching bootleg cabs. That's it.

Followed by a temper tantrum that it's OK for them to break the law because they say so.

Sorry, but childish selfish douchebag isn't a business model. This is just more .com era crap of a tech company thinking they're magical because they say so.

Re:It's probably too late

[bkmoore]

Uber is a multibillion dollar company now....

No, Uber has been 'valued' as a multi-billion dollar company by the venture capitalists who are backing them. It has nothing to do with Uber's actual economic activity or the net-worth of their assets and cash. When venture capitalists put a value anything, it really means that is their asking price for that "investment". It has nothing to do with true economic value. I personally am willing to go out on a limb and would value Uber somewhere between my kid brother's lemonade stand (proven profitability) and a decomissioned Russian aircraft carrier (proven scrap value). Exactly where in that range Uber falls, I cannot say. But then again, I'm not a venture capitalist.