American company Uber will be rolling out audio recordings of their rides soon. The roll-out will take place first in Mexico and Brazil, where they will test the new feature to improve “safety” and its image. If all goes well in Central and South America, then Uber has plans on implementing the audio-recording requirement in the U.S.
According to The Guardian, the opt-in feature will allow customers to choose if they want all of their trips to be recorded or if it’s available only on select trips.
The article explains the security measures that Uber will reportedly go through to ensure that the audio recordings aren’t abused, where they write…
“The feature will allow customers to opt into recording all or select trips. Recordings will be stored on the rider or driver’s phone and encrypted to protect privacy, and users will not be able to listen to them. They can later share a recording with Uber, which will have an encryption key, if they want to report a problem.”
That actually sounds a lot more intuitive than I thought it would be.
Even still, privacy risks still exists, and this was even admitted to by Thom Rickert, the vice-president and emerging risk specialist at Trident Public Risk Solutions, who told The Guardian…
“It probably is not going to prevent something from happening. It will probably just help you analyze what can we do to change outcomes the next time. […]
“[…] It’s a digital recording. It’s going to exist on a server somewhere. Yes, it can be encrypted. Yes, it can be hacked … so that is a privacy concern for the individual that has lost control over that recording.”
It doesn’t sound like much of a net benefit for the end-user, unless of course you’re robbed, raped, or killed, and you chose to have the ride recorded. The data might help in that case… but then again if the perpetrator robs or kills you and takes your phone and disables the recording, then it’s all kind of moot anyway… right?
(Thanks for the news tip Quickshooter MK2)