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Here's Uber's respose to the Met Police's letter with their version of the story: https://www.uber.com/en-GB/blog/how-uber-in-london-works-wit...

> A complaint was made that, following a trip, a driver got out of the car and hugged a female passenger. This violates our community guidelines and the driver was prevented from using our app while we investigated. He was subsequently given clear direction concerning his alleged behaviour prior to being reinstated on the app. When a second complaint was made some time later, of the same driver touching a rider’s leg, it was decided that we could no longer maintain our partnership with the driver and he was permanently stopped from using our app. At the same time we informed TfL of the allegations in order that they could consider revoking his private hire licence and prevent him from working with any other operators in London. We deal with all complaints on a case by case basis but swiftly identify and deal with any pattern of alleged behaviour such as this. As stated above, we also advise individuals to report incidents to the police and support them in doing so.

From the OP:

> Both cases were charged as sexual assaults and are at court next week for hearing... While Uber did not say they would contact the police the victim believed that they would inform the police on her behalf.

The fact that the victim thought Uber would contact the police, and that the prosecutor has decided there's a case to hear, suggests that this was more than "a hug". We don't have all the information here, but I'm quite uneasy with this downplaying of a potential sexual assault (one that is currently being heard in court).

> Uber hold a position not to report crime on the basis that it may breach the rights of the passenger. When asked what the position would be in the hypothetical case of a driver who commits a serious sexual assault against a passenger they confirmed that they would dismiss the driver and report to TfL, but not inform the police.

Regardless of whether the individual case doesn't sound bad in Uber's telling, their stated position on a hypothetical serious sexual assault is very concerning. Either way it shows either disregard or ignorance for the regulatory environment under which they operate. (It sounds to me like ignorance, since they did report the driver to TfL, and neglected to inform the police as required).

This reminds me of the quote: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” - Upton Sinclair

Uber's statement potentially demonstrates the exact problem with self-investigating. Given the negative PR from a sexual assault story, Uber employees have a strong incentive to convince themselves that nothing happened and that it was just a "hug".

Uber's statement would be the third significant moral failure in a single incident.

Uber is under obligation to report serious crimes to the police. From their description though, I am not sure it qualifies:

> A complaint was made that, following a trip, a driver got out of the car and hugged a female passenger

I bet it was unpleasant, uncomfortable, unprofessional and a bunch of other "un"s but does getting hugged on a street (not when confined in a car) supports a serious crime claim in the UK or US? This is an honest question, I would really like to know the answer.

> does getting hugged on a street (not when confined in a car) supports a serious crime claim in the UK or US?

In some US jurisdictions, and from what I can tell in England and Wales, it would be the crime of battery when done without consent.

>but does getting hugged on a street (not when confined in a car) supports a serious crime claim in the UK or US?

It depends on what that "hug" really was - walking up behind a woman, wrapping my hands around them and grabbing their breasts might be considered a "hug" but it's also sexual assault.

That's absurd. No reasonable person would call groping someone's breasts a "hug".

Unfortunately, not all people are reasonable.

of course they would, to protect their image, be vary cautious with statements like this

And such a person does not qualify as reasonable.

> But here Uber was directly involved in enabling sexual assault and misleading the victim

I can't really comment on the "misleading" charge (and it seems pretty vague in your quotes as well), but "directly involved in enabling sexual assault" is FUD like no other - if that's your claim, then every employeer is "directly involved"!

At the end of the day, Uber isn't (and shouldn't be) responsible (nor qualified) for solving (sex) crime - the police are!

There are two parts to this. First, we don't know how the conversations went between Uber and the vitcims, because both viticms seen to have the impressions Uber would report this to the police, which is odd given the viticms should report to the police first. But on the other hand, Uber should work with the viticms to ensure the viticms are reporting to the police. Imaginr you were sexually assaulted on the train, on campus, or at work, not only you should contact the police yourself, but the administration should engage in aid. A train station worker shouldn't just stand next to a vitcim and say well the alleged attacker denies it so we are lettig the attack go. If you were assaulted at work, you should find someone you can trust and go to either the HR and call the cops. Uber is not responsible for the attack, but as a company it has the responsibility to take every claim seriously, and ensure law enforcement is involved, because Uber's reputation and customer trust are at stake. Every company should have a crisis protocol.

On the other hand, I can't think of better example than Uber's toxic company cultute. Harassments gone to blackhole with HR....

> but as a company it has the responsibility to take every claim seriously, and ensure law enforcement is involved,

I disagree. Customers expecting this results in the awkward situation we're in today. If instead we train people to rely on themselves (and the police), many of these situations could be avoided (or, at least, resolved in a better way).

The problem is that the victim only has the data from the app. Only Uber has the actual identity of the driver. If Uber is unwilling to cooperate with the police, getting the identity will at least require a court order.

If Uber behaved correctly, they would've reported the case to the police with the identity of the driver. This process is much faster and allows for a quicker police investigation.

They are willing to cooperate with the police. They just don't file the complaints themselves. I would say this is reasonable since it is the policy at all companies I have worked with as well.

Any charge of employees doing criminal acts are reported by those who see them. If no one else at the company sees it, then it is left up to the alleged victim. They company does not want to be seen as attacking it's employees based in hearsay.

In Ubers case these aren't even employees so they are left carrying hearsays to the police against third parties.

> They are willing to cooperate with the police.

From the article:

> It is expected, however, that serious crimes will be dealt with promptly, and reported directly to the police as well.

And

> At this point, the police attempted to investigate (pepper spray is an offensive weapon in the UK) but, the letter indicated, Uber refused to provide more information unless a formal request via the Data Protection Act was submitted.

But they report every crime if they're the victim:

> Uber are however proactive in reporting lower level document frauds to both the MPS and LTPH.

> At this point, the police attempted to investigate (pepper spray is an offensive weapon in the UK) but, the letter indicated, Uber refused to provide more information unless a formal request via the Data Protection Act was submitted.

If I understood correctly, the victim did not contact the police, but that Uber contacted the police after the second assault, after which the scenario above happened. Also, why is it an issue for the police to make a formal request and why does this reflect negatively, instead of positively, on Uber?

Police shouldn't need to make a formal request, because Uber should have reported it after the first instance.

Police are not asking for hidden confidential information here. They're asking Uber to obey the licensing conditions, which are to report criminal behaviour of their drivers.

Do the licensing conditions require taxi services to report contractor addresses, telephone numbers, and rider history immediately anytime there is any potential criminal dispute?

If so, then essentially your history is an open book to any UK police departments.

If not, then your ride history is safe under the Data Protection Act.

DPA isn't some black magic. Medical providers are required to report abuses as well, but they don't send patient history or tell who else an employee has worked with or on unless there's a formal request.

Regardless, I hope that Uber comes into compliance with the ULL shortly, and their future behavior is not merely in line with the standard but better than that of other smaller minicab companies.

>They are willing to cooperate with the police

Except when they aren't: https://fymhotsauce.rocks/blogs/news/my-uber-driver-robbed-m...

Except as a taxi operator (in London) they are required to report these incidents to the police if they are made aware of them. They appear not to, to the extent that the Met have complained.

> Only Uber has the actual identity of the driver.

That's strange. Everywhere I go in Europe and Scandinavia the taxi displays the photo ID card of the driver.

Bit hard to get that if you've left the car and the driver assaults you.

Regulated taxis do, but cars hired via the Uber app don't. (You might see the first name in the app, but that's it).

First name and license plate. That should be enough for the police to go off of.

But still harder than getting name, address and phone number from uber. The car can be registered to someone else which drags out the process.

You missed my early point. Please read what I wrote. I advocate viticms to report first. But Uber has the responsibility to ensure these allegations are rightfully documented. If someone punched you in the face at Starbuck, what is the first thing the worker say to you? "Are you okay?" What else will the worker say? "What happened? Do you want me to call 911?"

Usually stores have policy to notify manager so the manager can decide what to do. If Uber treat this kind of allegations as a normal support ticket, and nothing is done, well, fml. It better now come up with a better protocol so the support team has a manaul book to follow.

eyko's post above suggests that they went above and beyond what you're suggesting (including reporting the incident to TfL and "firing" the driver). (Unless Uber are lying, of course, which is unlikely IMO, but less unlikely than for most other companies.)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15330392

Reporting to TfL isn't even the minimum requirement, so I'm not sure how you get from "don't do enough" to going "above and beyond".

And if you start your campaign, perhaps in time you can shift the norms to be what you think they should be. Today, however, the London PtB have expectations that are not being met in this arena and the power to say 'no'. And yet Uber insists on being the definition of a snowflake - somehow their competitors are perfectly capable of interacting with the police and regulators.

Uber is clearly competent to report criminal assaults. They report other things. And ignoring their apparent PR desires, it looks not just stupid and a caricature of bro-havior, but also absurd - why make not reporting sexual assault the hill you want to die on? If I were an investor... Oh wait, there are already lawsuits flying (indirectly) over this behavior.

Uber has a choice. Keep acting like multinational frat house, and likely be pecked to death by more actions like this, or accept that others have no obligation to hold them in the same extreme esteem they apparently hold themselves, and act like they want to run a business in the real world, in which laws exist.

Or, hey, go Galt already. Please.

..so companies shouldn't do anything when their employees are accused of committing a sex crime on the job?

> At the end of the day, Uber isn't (and shouldn't be) responsible (nor qualified) for solving (sex) crime - the police are!

This is the point of the article.

ULL is regulated by TfL and are required to report serious crimes to the police in a timely manner.

They haven't done so, by their own policy, and this has resulted in repeat offences of sexual crimes.

You may now say "the victim should report it", but be aware that you will be blaming the victim here, and the victims did report it... directly to Uber. Uber, who are required to notify the police and failed to do so in a timely way and that allowed repeat offences to occur.

I think by reading the linked letter that Uber aren't legally required to pass crime reports on to the police, but it seems that everyone assumes they have a moral responsibility to do so. I suspect all the other cab firms have a working relationship with the police in this regard.

Just read the operator guidelines and compliance guidelines. They appear to be obliged to fully investigate all complaints and resolve them within 6 months and to keep full records for a further 6 months after that date.

I suspect the police and regulators' interpretation is that they (Uber) cannot possibly investigate sexual offences and so the only correct handling of such a complaint is to immediately notify the police.

But you are correct... the phrasing is ambiguous in the guidelines. But then... UK law :) everything is ambiguous and the default is whatever a "reasonable person" (typically a judge and jury, but in this case the regulator themselves) would interpret the guidelines as being.

Not just the moral responsibility. They mustn't endanger passengers safety. Not reporting sexual assault to the police with the consequence of it happening again appears to violate that.

Uber can't deflect responsibility for this onto the police if they refused to pass it on in the first place and then didn't provide information when asked.

I don't understand what reality a person lives in where their first response after a crime as serious as sexual assault is to go complain to Uber rather than go directly to the police. That said Uber should have advised the victim to contact the police immediately.

"Shock and numbness: Feelings of confusion, being easily overwhelmed, not knowing how to feel or what to do, feeling “spacey” or “out of it.” You may react in a way that is similar to your reactions during other crises in your life (for example with tears, irritability, nervous laughter, withdrawing)."

https://sapac.umich.edu/article/161

You don't understand the reality of sexual assault, where many victims don't report to police because of precisely the kind of bullshit dismissal we see in this thread.

Maybe I don't. Doesn't really change anything. You go to the Police to report crimes and she went to Uber. If your SO get's murdered in McDonalds I would better my bottom dollar your first reaction wouldn't be to seek out McDonald's management.

Even if the police dismiss your claim, don't they keep a note somewhere and pay more attention the second time the guy is reported?

Who are you to decide what someone understands?

If someone is sexually assaulted and reports it to Uber and not the police, I'd bet money that person is a liar.

>If someone is sexually assaulted and reports it to Uber and not the police,

>that person is a liar.

non sequitur

What is going on with this site? Have these people never used UBER before???

The reason they are reporting it to Uber is because when you get out of the car, you are immediately prompted for a rating and a TIP for the driver! Uber is almost forcing you to report a driver who makes you feel uncomfortable.

I'm not saying they shouldn't call the police AFTER. But there is nothing strange about them reporting this instance through Uber's channels.

when you get out of the car, you are immediately prompted for a rating and a TIP for the driver! Uber is almost forcing you to report a driver who makes you feel uncomfortable.

Not only that, but if you get out of the car before you reach your destination, Uber displays a large dialog asking if everything is okay and if you need to report a problem. I can't find a screenshot of that exact dialog, but it included some of the options at the bottom of this screenshot (eg I was involved in an accident, My driver was unprofessional.)

https://media.consumeraffairs.com/files/reviews/uber_163101....

The choice of words is the key. “He sexually assaulted her” actually means “he gave her a hug”. It’s evident she wouldn’t report something like that to the police.

Reporting an unwanted hug (to the police, not to the media) as a “sexual assault” is clearly not going to fly.

I like how the frustrated randos who create accounts on this site purely to justify sexual violence against women can't even be assed to read the article. The one where the police were given the evidence and it's now going to court:

> It is also worth noting that once Uber supplied police with the victim’s details both have welcomed us contacting them and have fully assisted with the prosecutions. Both cases were charged as sexual assaults and are at court next week for hearing.

I strongly suggest being, like, 1000% less overt with your next account. Then, your position on the matter will only be "very obvious", not "mind-numbingly, unbelievably obvious"

Whatever happened, she did in fact report it to the police (after realizing that Uber wasn't going to on her behalf) and it is coming up in the courts. Presumably the courts will hear her characterization of the events then, as well as Uber's, which is all we've heard so far ("he gave her a hug").

And even more damning:

"In total, Uber had failed to report six sexual assaults, two public order offences and one assault to the police. This had lead to delays of up to 7 months before they were investigated. Particularly damning, with the public order offences this meant that in both cases the prosecution time limit had passed before the police became aware of them."

People should report crimes to police, they shouldn't report them to school or company. Everyone who tells the opposite enables sexual assault. Uber is not at fault in this situation and it doesn't enable anything.

This is not what the Metropolitan Police think. https://cdn.londonreconnections.com/2013/12042017-NB-to-Hele...

If I understood the letter correctly, what Uber did was not illegal. And if I understand how police works in most countries, if you report a crime to police they are obliged to investigate it

So my point stands. If you think that people shouldn't report crimes, you enable crimes. "‘strongly under the impression’ that they would." is a laughable excuse. What did Uber do that would provide a strong impression, yet wasn't enough to be accused of being misleading in court?

If what Uber did is illegal in UK, they should face punishment. But as far as I can tell, they did nothing illegal in this situation.

I see lots of folks trying out an argument along the lines of, "if Uber managers aren't being marched in front of magistrates, then everything's peachy and Leave Uber Alloooone!" I can't wait for the ads "Uber - not officially a criminal enterprise yet!"

Unfortunately, this argument ignores the fact that requirements for unusual privileges - like running massive fleets of vehicles on public streets - are a bit higher than the requirements for staying out of jail.

Reporting sexual assault is not exactly difficult. Whether it is a cynical PR issue, some weird philosophical thing, or simply bizarre institutional/emotional damage around sexual assault[1], Uber has a problem that they are apparently incapable of handling, even with years, warnings and a near complete change of management.

It really is freakish.

[1] Given so many different incidents handled over multiple years in multiple countries, that their competitors don't seem to have the same problem with, I'm starting to wonder, frankly.

Nobody is suggesting that Uber did anything illegal, their licence to operate is being revoked.

And I didn't suggest that it shouldn't be revoked.

Businesses should also report crimes to the police. A business who does the opposite enables sexual assault. Uber is at fault in this situation and directly enables sexual assault.

The only difference between what I'm saying and what you're saying is that I imply Uber is run by people and you imply they are a force of nature (or something.)

If you've been a victim of a crime, you should report it. If you've witnessed a crime, you should report it too. Otherwise you enable criminals. If you were told that there were a crime by a random person, you don't have to report it. I think it is as simple as that. I don't think or imply that Uber is a force of nature, I don't know where you got this idea from.

> Uber is not at fault in this situation

Keeping a sexual predator as a driver is the right choice?

Oh come on there's way more nuance to this issue than you're letting on. Taking away a person's livelihood can be just as bad as a jail sentence and you're acting like companies should act as judge and executioner in the court of public opinion. What's the point of even having a justice system when we can dispatch a lifetime of suffering by blacklisting suspected criminals from employment?

This whole things seems just like "But her emails!" where people are latching onto anything they can to justify their dislike for something they already hate.

Is there really that much more nuance? Uber received a complaint of sexual assault by a driver. The victim was under the impression that Uber would contact the police. Uber did not contact the police and continued to employ the driver. Uber then received a second complaint of sexual assault by the same driver. The second victim was "strongly under the impression" that the police would be contacted. The police were not contacted.

In this situation, Uber are complicit in the second sexual assault to at least some degree. (Perhaps they carried out a thorough investigation which presented nothing. Perhaps they did not carry out an investigation again). They are complicit in any further sexual assaults this driver carries out.

With regards to "Taking away a person's livelihood", that's precisely what a police investigation and CRB/DBS checks are for. The driver simply should not be allowed in such a position if they have a history of sexual assault. No-one is asking for the company to "act as judge and executioner" (in fact, in this case the company is doing exactly that except ruling not-guilty), merely to alert the appropriate authorities so that a legitimate investigation can be carried out according to the established judicial system.

If Uber is complicit, where are the charges? Where are the fines? Where are managers getting jailed for concealment of a crime? Is there even a prosecution?

The most direct effect of Uber being complicit is that their license is not being renewed.

And yes, as the article states, there are prosecutions in both cases.

Uber is not having license, which is a big punishment I would say, is fine on top also needed? Concealment of a crime and failure to report one are two different things with two different punishments. And while I believe companies crimes should be personalized to managers who lead employees to commit them, where such thing can be proven, jail time for this one would be probably too much of a punishment.

We dont need to jail for everything, really. It is expensive and ineffective overall.

It is the job of the justice system to understand whether he is guilty or not. I think that if a company fires a person for a claim of sexual assault that wasn't proved, this person is justified to sue the fuck out of the company for false pretense.

Innocent until proven guilty.Uber respected due process expecting that if the allegation are true the police would have arrested the man. Uber is not a court, it does not and in my opinion should not have the right to play judge.

Isn't he an alleged* sexual predator?

How often do you think this kind of thing happens with regular taxis? public transport?

My gut says it's extremely common, you just are not hearing about it.

I am not following your defense of Uber. Let’s assume sexual assault is equally common among Uber drivers and regular taxi drivers.

It is still not material to the complaint. The complaint is that regulators are getting adequate and timely reporting from regular taxi companies so they can investigate. But not from Uber. This is leading to unnecessary safety issues for Uber riders.

I don't read it as a defense, its a necessary prerequisite question to ask to put this situation in its proper context.

Every sexual assault is horrific - but what if we look closer and discover that the rate of sexual assaults per ride from Uber is less than that from established cab services?

That completely inverts the situation and we would need to ask "What is Uber doing right, and how can the other services emulate their success?"

What if we discover they are about the same? Well, then Uber isn't anything exceptional and we have an industry-wide problem that needs addressing at all levels.

Either way, we don't even know where the real problem is if we don't start with those kinds of questions.

First, no matter what the statistics look like, it doesn't excuse Uber's failure to report sexual assault and protect the people who have placed their trust in Uber.

Second, the statistics do not support Uber being any safer:

"A search query for “sexual assault” within Uber’s customer support ticketing system yielded 6,160 results, or 6,160 cases, for the period between December 2012 and August 2015. Plugging in the search term “rape” resulted in 5,827 tickets, while “assault” revealed 3,524 and “sexually assaulted” yielded 382. In the same report, BuzzFeed obtained data from the company indicating that it had received “fewer than” 170 sexual assault claims and five claims of rape over the same time span.

In a response to the BuzzFeed article, Uber’s heads of communications, safety and global support attributed the thousands of results to misspellings of the word “rate,” words and names that contain the word “rape” and discussions of the issue by passengers who were not personally facing assault.

A January 2015 report by the libertarian Cato Institute found ride-sharing services provided by Uber and its main competitor, Lyft Inc., to be about as safe as taking a cab, which, for drivers, was not exactly reassuring."

http://www.ibtimes.com/uber-sexual-assault-statistics-ride-s...

I think it's fair to say that India is a special(ly bad) case. I'd like to see the figures for London, which is what would be relevant here. From reading that excerpt in the context of this article, it would seem that ULL is doing a really bad job. Are the statistics in that article global?

*edited

Agreed, specific concrete failures about complying with reporting laws/regulations ought to be pointed out and criticized.

Only on Hacker News will someone find a way of taking an article, with a statement that is, in essence,

> Uber failed to report a driver to the police, on the basis of sexual assault against a passenger - said driver then went on his way and just somehow found himself with another sexual assault complaint later on, against ANOTHER woman, while still as an Uber driver -- which is a grave failure on their part

and somehow magically find a systematic way of making it into

> What if.......... hear me out........ just wait....... what if Uber could be the good one here?? Let's ignore the bit about two women being sexually assulted for a second and run the statistics and find out!!!!!!

Here's my alternative position, which I hope you entertain as enthusiastically as you do statistics: Uber was wrong, and no amount of statistics about their dumbass business -- or any of those pathetic "aw dangut, but we're just a startup, doin' a disruption!!!" spiels -- negates people being assaulted, due to their gross, obvious negligence. End of story.

Yeah, let's not get rationality and reason in the way of our emotions.

Rationality and reason say that since Uber is a black cab operator, they are, just like other black cabs, legally obligated to report these incidents to the police. They have failed to do so. Case closed.

The victims contacted Uber with the assumption that Uber will carry out that responsibility. Uber failed to do so.

> Uber is a black cab operator

FWIW, Uber is not a Hackney carriage (black cab) operator (regulated since 1654). Only these are allowed to ply the streets for hire, and drivers have to pass "The Knowledge".

Uber operates as a minicab operator.

http://www.londonblackcabs.co.uk/About.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackney_carriage

Well, I'm concerned about sexual assault when it happens, regardless of the cab/ride sharing service that employs the perpetrator.

IMHO, a great deal of people here only car if the perpetrator is employed by Uber.

Your argument suggests that it's acceptable to expect businesses to a race to the bottom on safety, peace of mind and quality.

Well between the established facts with Uber and some internet person's "gut feeling" I guess I would discount the latter.

I can't even believe people are making excuses for Uber like this.

In addition to this, the comment you're replying to comes across as dismissive of the issue on the basis of it being common elsewhere. In other words, "TfL are not justified in taking punitive measures against Uber for deliberately failing to report sexual assault because other places also fail to report sexual assault". Needless to say, that sort of apologia is horrific

Perhaps I'm reading more into the comment than was intended, perhaps that is the correct amount.

This is the worst kind of what-aboutism. You should be ashamed.

>If a serious crime (like this one) is suspected, companies have an obligation to report this and not just conduct their own investigations which will have an inherent bias.

Why are rape accusations ever investigated outside of a legal context by police? They do the same thing in colleges and it boggles my mind how anyone would think that's a good course of action.

Context:

When a local cab driver does anything like this, it is local news implicating a small local company if that.

When an uber driver does anything like this, it is international news.

I think this should factor in to your risk assessment of using Uber versus any other service.