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posted by martyb on Thursday November 03 2016, @04:46PM   Printer-friendly
from the privacy-takes-another-hit dept.

http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-uber-privacy-20161102-story.html

Uber is taking its ride-hailing app down a new road in an effort to make it smarter, simpler and more fun to use. The redesigned app also will seek to mine personal information stored on smartphones in a change that could raise privacy concerns, even though it will be up to individual users to let Uber peer into their calendars and address books. The change represents the biggest overhaul in four years to Uber Technologies Inc.'s popular app, which is used by millions of people to summon cars in more than 450 cities around the world for rides that are usually cheaper than traditional taxis.

[...] In another time-saving move that will test how much users trust the San Francisco-based company with their personal information, users will be able to give the app access to their calendars so addresses listed in an entry can automatically appear in the Uber app near the time of the appointment. Uber plans to introduce this option by next month. Starting in December, Uber will also seek access to users' personal contacts so they can ask for a ride to wherever a friend currently is. If this feature is activated, Uber's app will contact the friend to ask if he or she is willing to share the current location. If the friend doesn't have the Uber app, the request will be sent through a text message to the mobile number listed in the address book.

Uber says it doesn't expect privacy objections because users will have to agree to allow the app to scan their calendars and address books. And people whose locations are being sought through the new address-book feature will be able to decide whether they want to share the information.

Also at The Verge, CNET, and WSJ.


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  • (Score: 2) by frojack on Friday November 04 2016, @08:22AM

    by frojack (1554) on Friday November 04 2016, @08:22AM (#422408) Journal

    We'll probably learn that Google and Apple were secretly NSA funded projects.

    Seriously, Google is doing the NSA's work for them.
    The only evidence to the contrary is nobody has spilled their guts about such a secret yet, and since nobody can keep a secret in this country you would have expected that by now.

    I'm still pretty sure the NSA bought Skype twice, once by funding ebay, then when they proved to be incompetent, once again when Microsoft acquired it. Microsoft promptly did the NSA's bidding and got rid of all the distributed directory services and started doing all the call setup through their own servers. [zdnet.com] So easy to tap now.

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  • (Score: 2) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Friday November 04 2016, @04:09PM

    by Scruffy Beard 2 (6030) on Friday November 04 2016, @04:09PM (#422511)

    Conspiracies don't have to be directed by any intelligence to be true.

    You can have a "conspiracy of events" result in a a specific outcome, for example.