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Uber Trained Employees on How To 'Impede, Obstruct or Influence' Ongoing Legal Investigations, Ex-employee Says (cnbc.com)

Posted by msmash on from the oh-boy dept.

From a report on CNBC: Uber faced fresh allegations on Tuesday that it deliberately took steps to keep " unlawful schemes from seeing the light of day." Hours of testimony on Tuesday centered around a letter from a former Uber security analyst's attorney to an Uber lawyer. The former analyst, Richard Jacobs, said in the letter there was a directive for Uber employees to use disappearing chat apps like Wickr, and that Uber sent employees to Pittsburgh (where it's developing its autonomous vehicles) to "educate" them on how to prevent "Uber's unlawful schemes from seeing the light of day." He reportedly made other bombshell allegations in the letter, including that employees at Uber were trained to "impede" ongoing investigations, multiple media outlets reported.

62 comments

  1. they need some contempt of court a few days by Joe_Dragon · · Score: 1

    they need some contempt of court a few days in county will fix them.

    1. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by powerlord · · Score: 4, Interesting

      So if companies are legally People ... can they hold the Company in Contempt and force it to cease operation while it is "in jail"?

      --
      This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
    2. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by nospam007 · · Score: 1

      "they need some contempt of court a few days in county will fix them."

      Court? I thought court would come in play only after any investigation was finished.

      This IMHO falls under the good advice of "Don't talk to the police, EVER!, it can only hurt you."

    3. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by AvitarX · · Score: 1

      Court comes into play throughout an investigation.

      Court orders and warrents and what not. I'm not weighing in on if any court mandates we're violated though.

      --
      Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
    4. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by k6mfw · · Score: 2

      Unless a company is put on death row like people, then it is not a people.

      --
      mfwright@batnet.com
    5. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by sheph · · Score: 2

      This is where if a corporation is people then the executive officers and the board should be the ones on the hook for something like this. This wasn't a unilateral decision it was corporate practice. And the only way you stop things like this from becoming a recurring theme is to hold them accountable.

      --
      I don't believe in karma, I just call it like I see it.
    6. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by Cajun+Hell · · Score: 1

      There are degrees of peopleness. Perhaps Uber's degree can be increased, through application of pain, fear, sensory deprivation, or crushed dreams.

      --
      "Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
    7. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 1
      This argument is at least 175 years old.

      When Britain, and rest of Europe, were creating limited liability companies, it was opposed because no one would go to jail if the company defaults. Those were the days of debtor's prison.

      Who goes to jail for a company's criminal actions has always been a vexing questions.

      We have jailed GE executives for breaking monopoly and anti-trust laws back in 1910s. But sadly we have gone for too long without sending these executives to jail. Just a few in jail would bring back balance to the Force.

      --
      sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
    8. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by sphealey · · Score: 2

      - - - - - So if companies are legally People ... can they hold the Company in Contempt and force it to cease operation while it is "in jail"? - - - - -

      Arthur Andersen says hi.

    9. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The problem is the accountability is pushed down the ranks while the profits are pushed up - privatize the gains, socialize the losses. The only people that will suffer from any misbehavior of Uber are their staff and their customers.

      Try to punish Uber and you'll punish their staff first, and a lot of those staff are paycheck types that have no power or influence or any meaningful way to steer Uber in a better direction. Also remember as a paycheck employee you're on the hook to do *EXACTLY* as you're told. You don't question corporate law because they have lawyers for that and it's above your paygrade. When the lawyer says "yeah, just lie" you do exactly that and only that or you get fired and you and your family, wife and children die in poverty on the street. Judges simply don't understand this because they aren't ever on the hook for anything and they don't need to answer to anyone. Easy to be an idealist in that reality.

      Also it's tragically dishonest to presume that anyone has any power in this system and holding anyone accountable because they didn't exercise their "faux phantom-power" doesn't help anyone - it's just yelling at children to make the grownups behave. They won't. You're yelling at the wrong people.

      What exactly is "Uber Leadership"? Who is it? It's probably not who you think it is.

    10. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This IMHO falls under the good advice of "Don't talk to the police, EVER!, it can only hurt you."

      No it doesn't. It's a civil case and this the part known as "discovery". Parties cannot hide or destroy evidence, nor can they impede.

    11. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by findoutmoretoday · · Score: 1

      "Don't talk to the police, EVER!, it can only hurt you."

      That's what Weinstein was saying: Don't talk to police, ever, as it will hurt you.

    12. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by Dog-Cow · · Score: 1

      That's why corporate malfeasance has to end with the executives tortured to death on national television. Then, losing your job when the company is closed doesn't seem so bad, and perhaps a few people will think before ordering hundreds of people to break the law.

    13. Re:they need some contempt of court a few days by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      How it usually works is that the low-level employees are given quotas or targets that are impossible to make legally, and then they can be fired if any authority catches on. That way, the corporate officers keep their noses clean and don't take responsibility for their decisions. In this case, it looks like an actual policy to implement illegal policies and cover them up, which is more dangerous.

      Thing is, though, to send someone to prison for a crime requires proving that that person actually committed it. A corporation is likely to be able to diffuse responsibility to the point that it's impossible to prove any individual is guilty.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
  2. Uber is a criminal enterprise. by WCMI92 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The company needs dissolution, the principals arrested and all assets seized.

    --
    Corporatism != Free Market
    1. Re: Uber is a criminal enterprise. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The execs need to be hung at the town square.

    2. Re:Uber is a criminal enterprise. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It would be interesting to see if they could somehow bring RICO charges...

    3. Re: Uber is a criminal enterprise. by easyTree · · Score: 1

      Head of <genericOldeWorldeTaxiFirm>, is that you?

      --
      Requiem for the American Dream
    4. Re:Uber is a criminal enterprise. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Trump is next.

    5. Re:Uber is a criminal enterprise. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So what assets do they actually have?

      Their business model is to use the assets of their employees ^H^H^H drivers instead of their own.
      Then make these more efficient with their platform.

      Aside from the relationship with their drivers and customers, what do they have that is not easily recreated without the baggage?

    6. Re:Uber is a criminal enterprise. by Rick+Schumann · · Score: 1

      Here I was going to post my own comment to the effect of "Is it just me, or does Uber look and act like a totally criminal enterprise, like literally run by the Mob or something?", and you beat me to it. ;-)

      We are in complete agreement. Uber needs to go away.

    7. Re:Uber is a criminal enterprise. by bferrell · · Score: 1

      As of this exact moment, Uber own the old Sears building in downtown Oakland. They paid over 100 million and it looks like they'll be able to sell it for double.

      That's just off the top of my head.

    8. Re: Uber is a criminal enterprise. by sound+vision · · Score: 1

      Ah, and who do you think runs the Taxi Commission?

      Legality aside, I'm not convinced that Uber is any *morally* worse than the guys they replace. Of course, both organizations are in dire need of improvement. The question for the rest of us is: which business model is easier to regulate, sue, whatever, into a state of fairness? I haven't been convinced that that's the commission-and-medallion model... LONG history of problems there. But I'm willing to hear arguments...

    9. Re:Uber is a criminal enterprise. by vtcodger · · Score: 1

      "The company needs dissolution, the principals arrested and all assets seized."

      Is that going to affect the stock price?

      --
      You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
    10. Re:Uber is a criminal enterprise. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It will be the target of a RICO prosecution. And all the silicon billionaires will lose their investments.

  3. hmm by supernova87a · · Score: 0

    Well, to be fair, your own using of your incognito browser might count as "using tools to impede, obstruct, or influence legal investigation", if someone was later interested in suing or prosecuting you for: 1) purchasing alcohol while underage, 2) browsing someone's LinkedIn profile to try to poach them for your company, 3) bypassing ads and depriving them of revenue.

    Lots of things depend on how they're looked back on later...

    1. Re:hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Regardless how you look at Uber they are criminals, they are screwing employees, they are screwing customers, they are screwing authorities and more!

      I will never use Uber even if they are the last company on Earth.

    2. Re:hmm by jedidiah · · Score: 0

      You are of course entirely missing the point.

      Using untraceable and uncrackable methods of communications are not inherently illegal. They aren't by themselves obstruction of justice.

      These kinds of things are standards that apply equally to everyone including you. It doesn't matter how much you hate them. You don't get to apply a double standard to them.

      This is just more of the usual "professional trolling disguised as journalism" and you're lapping it up like an idiot with no self-awareness.

      --
      A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
    3. Re:hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Except Uber was under criminal investigation at the time, so this is destruction of evidence.

    4. Re: hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Except you forgot the part about them being under investigation. But that little detail doesn't matter.

      Fucking shill.

    5. Re:hmm by sphealey · · Score: 1

      If Uber is an incorporated entity in the United States then various laws and civil requirements apply, including Sarbanes-Oxley documentation requirements and Federal Rules of Civil Procedure business document archiving "guidelines" [where "guidelines" = requirements]. A brief introduction:

      http://www.metrocorpcounsel.co...

    6. Re:hmm by Paradise+Pete · · Score: 1

      Well, to be fair, your own using of your incognito browser might count as "using tools to impede, obstruct, or influence legal investigation"

      No, that would be after the investigation begins, not beforehand.

    7. Re:hmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      These kinds of things are standards that apply equally to everyone including you. It doesn't matter how much you hate them. You don't get to apply a double standard to them.

      Of course I apply a double standard. When I first time met a person I apply a standard, when I meet again a person who fucked me once, I apply another standard.

  4. The shills are quieter these days, eh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Time was if you tripped over on slashdot you'd hit an Uber fan.

    1. Re:The shills are quieter these days, eh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is a forecast of what will happen to Musk and Tesla next.

    2. Re:The shills are quieter these days, eh by easyTree · · Score: 1

      Time was if you tripped over on slashdot you'd hit an Uber fan.

      Yeap; now it's just the shills for <theWayThingsWereCorp>.

      --
      Requiem for the American Dream
  5. Uber is the new Mafia by jtara · · Score: 1

    See subject.

  6. Shades of gray by Lije+Baley · · Score: 3, Informative

    Other companies do this, just not in so many words. Aside from the nudging and winking policies, some things are done under overt, yet bogus reasons. My company now deletes virtually all email after 3 months, to better manage storage resources and adhere to best practices for retention.

    --
    Strange things are afoot at the Circle-K.
    1. Re:Shades of gray by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      For damned good reasons too. "Give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men..." Given how things work in the US, you're crazy if you do anything else.

    2. Re:Shades of gray by Khyber · · Score: 2

      "My company now deletes virtually all email after 3 months, to better manage storage resources and adhere to best practices for retention."

      So if your company is a public company, you're in violation of Sec 802(a)(1) and 802(a)(2) Sarbanes-Oxley data retention laws!

      --
      Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
    3. Re:Shades of gray by swillden · · Score: 1

      Other companies do this, just not in so many words. Aside from the nudging and winking policies, some things are done under overt, yet bogus reasons. My company now deletes virtually all email after 3 months, to better manage storage resources and adhere to best practices for retention.

      Three months is rather short. Most companies have a one year retention policy. This isn't for any nefarious reasons, and it's not to save disk space. It's to limit the information available to discovery during lawsuits, less to make the information unavailable than to eliminate the need to pay lawyers lots and lots of money to comb through it to comply with discovery requests. Since any large company -- no matter how saintly -- is always involved in multiple lawsuits, this saves huge amounts of money.

      --
      Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
    4. Re:Shades of gray by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Email could be archived for 7 years. That is the "best practice". Users are blind to the process. All mail that transverses the system becomes archived. All mail in user and group mailboxes are deleted after 90 days, but the archive remains.

      This is a process to keep only one copy of an email instead of many (one for sender, one for each recipient, one for archival) and disallow users from deleting mail before it becomes archived.

    5. Re:Shades of gray by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think that is as much to defend against the burden of being ordered to produce material out of those records as it is about what might be in those records. It is a common litigation tactic to try to bankrupt your opponent with discovery. And yes, there is a line between legal document non-retention and illegal hiding of illegal activity. The only shades of gray is that some illegal things carry higher penalties than others.

  7. Maybe... by swillden · · Score: 2, Informative

    I'm not a fan of Uber as a company. They've done a lot of shady crap. But this sounds like it could also be normal corporate "speaking with care" training. Every company I've ever worked for has told me to be cautious with communicating about legally-sensitive topics in writing (including email and chat systems that archive conversations). Said training usually includes information about how to specify that written communication is attorney-client privileged, too, which makes it non-discoverable in most legal proceedings, plus a recommendation that if you're in doubt, you should hold your conversation in person or over the phone (or video conference).

    This is just normal stuff. Sure, it could be used to avoid leaving documentary evidence of illegal dealings, but that's not its intent. Its intent is to avoid generating large amounts of documentation that has to be reviewed in discovery, and which could be exploited by opposing counsel by mischaracterizing it or taking it out of context. For individual employees, it also tends to keep them out of the line of fire of subpoenas. If you mentioned a topic in discoverable communications, you're likely to get subpoenaed to give a deposition.

    It should be noted that if you're actually doing something illegal, and if your attorney is unethical enough to advise you on how to get away with it, the training shouldn't tell you to use any chat apps, or phone calls, etc., because there's always a chance that an investigation is already under way and that the communications medium is tapped. If you're committing crime, "speaking with care" recommendations are not good enough.

    --
    Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
    1. Re:Maybe... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Did you miss the part where it was said that the "speaking with care" directly pertained to the many publicly know and probably many more not known illegal activities by Uber.

      Uber willingly, publicly, and without question breaks the law at nearly all times. That is literally part of their DNA and business model - to go into regulated markets and give people a "taste" of cheap ride sharing before getting strong armed out by explicit government action. Then they hope the "common man" will push the government to make it NOT illegal to do what they just did.

  8. As if every corporation doesn't do this... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The Clinton Foundation does this even as the emails from Wikileaks have shown.

    1. Re: As if every corporation doesn't do this... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The Clinton foundation isn't a corporation you dolt. Troll harder next time please.

    2. Re: As if every corporation doesn't do this... by anegg · · Score: 1

      If the Clinton Foundation isn't a corporation, just what kind of legal entity is it? The dictionary definition of a "corporation" is a company or group of people authorized to act as a single entity (legally a person) and recognized as such in law. synonyms: company, firm, business, concern, operation, house, organization, agency, trust, partnership;

      The Clinton Foundation is a group of people authorized to act as a single entity.

    3. Re: As if every corporation doesn't do this... by Trailer+Trash · · Score: 1

      The Clinton foundation isn't a corporation you dolt. Troll harder next time please.

      Please alert the Arkansas Secretary of State - he seems pretty confused about this:

      http://www.sos.arkansas.gov/co...

      The IRS also thinks that this nonexistent corporation is a 501C3, probably want to alert them, also.

      --
      Do you have ESP?
  9. \o/ by easyTree · · Score: 1

    Uber must be pretty threatening; they appear to garner more attention than organised crime.

    --
    Requiem for the American Dream
    1. Re:\o/ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Uber must be pretty threatening; they appear to garner more attention than organised crime.

      You say that as if Uber and organized crime are two different things?

    2. Re:\o/ by bferrell · · Score: 1

      they ARE organized crime... just not the mafia or a regular street gang

  10. Comtempt of court? by bferrell · · Score: 1

    No,

    This is what racketeer influenced and corrupt organization (RICO) was invented for and it's how those whose hands are "clean" ( shareholders and all the rest who can't be directly connected to the acts, but profited anyway ) are held accountable for this type of operation.

    I'm certain this isn't the only one in the valley, but it's certainly about the most egregious.

     

  11. This just in: Trump Admin to use Uber by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Driver, take me to covfefe!"

  12. I drive for Lyft, but.. by Netdoctor · · Score: 1

    So this is me the last few months:

    "I could make more money if i drove for Uber too HOLY SHIT THE OWNER YELLED AT A DRIVER??"

    "Oh I'm overreacting, it's money HOLY CRAP SEXUAL ALLEGATIONS?"

    "I really need to relax and just apply, it's money in my pocke...WTF YOU GUYS PUT YOUR AWS CREDENTIALS IN A GITHUB REPO???"

    "My kid really deserves better, i should download the app and jus.....WHAT THE HELL THEY KNOWINGLY AND BRAZENLY SUBVERT THE LAW???"

    I really don't know what to say at this point...

    1. Re:I drive for Lyft, but.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I've maintained for a couple years now that Uber is a great idea implemented by rabid parasitic weasels. This view is not unique to me. I haven't spent enough time looking at Lyft to have an overall opinion about them, but they're clearly still a step up from Uber.

      Be aware, though, that Uber and Lyft are both practicing the driverless taxi mambo, and when they learn the footwork, it's tootles to you and your brethren.

    2. Re:I drive for Lyft, but.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      that great Idea was had in 1636 and is called TAXIS

  13. Or 5th ammendment rifghts by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I mean, you should lose those individually and collectively when you get a job or form a corporation, right?

  14. Oma by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Grandma Meg will teach them good