Uber has found itself at the centre of three new scandals including claims that the app purposely blocks officials from viewing law breaking drivers.
Mired in controversy, the San Francisco based ride-hailing app, has been accused of using it’s ‘Greyball’ Violation of Terms of Service method to block officials by showing officers a fake view of it’s app to make it more difficult to track potentially law breaking drivers.
Uber has allegedly used the method in Boston, Las Vegas, and even China and South Korea. The app can recognise people it deems a threat and shows them fake cars in the app which city officials were unable to hail due to being tagged as possible threats to the service.
Uber defended itself in a statement that said: “This program denies ride requests to fraudulent users who are violating our terms of service—whether that’s people aiming to physically harm drivers, competitors looking to disrupt our operations, or opponents who collude with officials on secret ‘stings’ meant to entrap drivers.”
Recently the company also lost a court battle against the public organisation Transport for London (tfl) which believes that Uber drivers should have to pass an English proficiency test to comply with tfl standards. Uber rejected this sating that the standard was too high and would cost the company 33,000 of its 110,000 London workforce would not meet requirements.
A High Court judge ruled against Uber, a move welcomed by London Black Cabs which believe that Uber has been undermining their business as they are not held to the same standards as they are.
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In a statement, Tom Elvidge, Uber’s General Manager in London said: “Writing an essay has nothing to do with communicating with passengers or getting them safely from A to B.”
The recent slew of controversies against the company has prompted the resignation of Vice President of product and growth, Ed Baker. The company has recently been embroiled in an internal investigation which alleges the company culture is wildly inappropriate.
Baker’s resignation comes amid an anonymous source from a report in Recode that the VP was seen “making out” with another employee at a company event. The source did not suggest that the incident was harassment of any kind.
Last week Senior Engineering Vice President Amit Singhal was forced to resign after allegations of harassment from his time at Google emerged.
Uber has been investigating claims of widespread harassment within the company since February, following former engineer Susan Fowler’s detailing of her time at the company.
Uber is currently worth an estimated $69 billion and following recent trends such as #DeleteUber, and a lawsuit alleging the company stole from Google, the company has found its every move scrutinised.
