Have you ever used a ride-sharing service?
They can be very convenient and affordable if you need to get somewhere and don’t have your own transportation.
You just open the company’s app, request a ride and just like that, your driver arrives within minutes.
But are you risking your privacy by using these ride-sharing companies? You might be surprised at what information Uber keeps that could be used against you.
Is using Uber putting your privacy at risk?
What we’re talking about is the Uber app. Whenever you use the app to request a ride, it stores both your pick-up and drop-off location. And there is no way to delete this information, every ride that you’ve ever taken shows up in the Uber app.
If you’ve used Uber and want to see your previous trips, open the app >> tap the 3 line main menu button in the upper-left corner >> tap Your Trips >> tap Past. You’ll see a full list of every ride that you have ever taken.
The problem is, so will anyone else if they get their hands on your phone. It’s a little creepy thinking someone could keep track of your comings and goings.
This is also becoming an issue in the legal system. Now, of course, we don’t condone people cheating on their significant others. However, family lawyers say unexplained trips with suspicious locations and drop-off times that are saved in Uber’s app history are being used as evidence in divorce court.
One attorney told the “Daily Mail,” “The fact that the Uber app stores location data and times can make it tough for someone who is cheating to explain their movements. The app will log everything from pick-up and drop-off destinations to journey times, which often corroborates that someone who is having an extramarital affair is lying about their whereabouts.”
There’s also another privacy issue in play with the Uber app. Apparently, if you log into your account using someone else’s phone, their phone will continue to receive notifications from Uber showing your locations. This seems to be a glitch in the iPhone iOS version of the app.
A man in France is suing Uber for nearly $52 million over the glitch. The man claims he requested a ride from Uber using his wife’s iPhone. He signed into his account on her phone to request the ride and then logged out of his account.
His wife kept getting notifications from Uber about the trips he was taking, even after he’d logged out of his account. The woman realized that he was cheating on her from his whereabouts and filed for divorce. Most people would say that it serves him right for cheating on his wife, which is probably true.