
Uber blocks drivers who picked up coronavirus-infected man - Zenst
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-51358042
======
burlesona
I found the headline misleading - Uber didn't permanently block the drivers,
it temporarily suspended them from driving. Uber also temporarily suspended
all the people who had been in the car that day. They also notified all these
folks and sent them info on health providers.

That actually sounds pretty prudent and helpful to me. If I were one of those
__240 __passengers, I 'd be a little upset to find out I'd been in a car after
someone carrying the virus, but grateful to know I'd been exposed. Then if I
started getting symptoms, instead of thinking "well, there's no corona virus
in Mexico, it's a cold, I'll just sleep it off," I'd go in for treatment right
away.

I realize it sucks for the drivers who are counting on driving income, but WOW
is an Uber driver an effective patient-zero, just two cars exposed meant 240
people exposed! Can you imagine if Uber _didn 't_ intervene after it knew
about the exposure? Future headline: thousands infected in Mexico after Uber
fails to quarantine exposed drivers.

~~~
tinus_hn
They could offer some kind of compensation for drivers they block that did
nothing wrong.

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kragen
This seems worrisome to me, because Uber is not directed by epidemiologists
and is in direct conflict with the governments they work for in many places.
The measure of suspending passengers will only be effective if those
passengers have no other means of transportation; more likely they will take
the bus, increasing the risk of contagion rather than decreasing it. I don't
trust Uber to make these tradeoffs.

Also, of course, it's unjust, especially if they aren't paying the drivers who
got exposed to the virus by the work they did for Uber. But every quarantine
measure is unjust; my concern is primarily that this one may be pointlessly or
even counterproductively unjust.

I wonder if we will see Uber using this kind of surveillance information for
political rather than epidemiological purposes in the future. Presumably it
can already be subpoenaed if, for example, a government is indicting a
journalist for sedition or treason, or a divorce lawyer is looking for dirt on
a spouse. But what about network analysis to identify people who are
associated with pro-taxi groups, or companies where suddenly everyone is
working late? Is there a stock trading angle there?

They did previously use this data to try to cut off Lyft:
[https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/apr/13/uber-
alle...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/apr/13/uber-allegedly-
used-secret-program-to-cripple-rival-lyft) and I think to identify police who
might be signing up as passengers.

~~~
ars
If Uber _didn 't_ do this, and the driver infected someone, everyone would be
screaming at them. (Witness people screaming at Uber for transporting a 12
year old who committed suicide - somehow that's Uber's fault.)

There's no way for them to win this unless government steps in and tells them
what to do.

~~~
geofft
There's an easy way for them to win - pay the drivers some amount, perhaps
their 50th percentile earnings of late, despite them not driving.

My own employer has a coronavirus policy, now: if you have traveled to China
for personal or work reasons, you're expected to work from home for two weeks
upon returning. We're not actually a company that has a work-from-home
program, and there are people who have left the company because
organizationally we won't allow remote work on an ongoing basis. We have a
culture that favors in-person meetings over making things available digitally
for remote employees. But there's a VPN, and for this purpose, the company
says, do what you can do from home and we'll still pay you your full salary.

(That sort of policy, by the way, is better _for society_ than Uber's - a
suspended Uber driver would spend their days doing things other than waiting
quietly at home. Probably they would try to make money, and especially in the
gig economy, they wouldn't have to tell anyone why they've got some free time
suddenly. Maybe they'd drive for Lyft. But if Uber said, stay home and we'll
pay you to stay home, they probably would.)

Then again, my employer actually has an employer-employee relationship, not a
reseller-vendor relationship.

(Another way to solve this, by the way, is enough of a social safety net that
the government can feel comfortable stepping in and saying "Stay home, and
we'll send you a government paycheck to stay home." Then Uber can keep
treating drivers as Galt-endorsed microbusinesses and not as expensive legacy
employees, but you still get the same benefits to society. Also, probably
you'd have better health insurance for the drivers.)

~~~
sieabahlpark
> There's an easy way for them to win - pay the drivers some amount, perhaps
> their 50th percentile earnings of late, despite them not driving.

That's not how contracting works.

~~~
geofft
It's not how it often works, yes, but parties are free to make whatever
contract they want. There's no rule that contracting can't work that way.

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dpflan
This is interesting with regard to granularity of tracing human movement and
interactions, privacy issues aside. Useful for analyzing such a public health
issue.

------
astannard
Well done Uber good move! I hope they compensated the driver and gave the
other passengers some free credits etc

------
catalogia
_" coronavirus man"_? That seems a shade dehumanizing.

Edit: I think the HN revision of the title, "coronoavirus-infected man", is a
lot better. _" Coronavirus man"_ sounds like the name of an awful superhero.

~~~
spectramax
Why? A man that has caught coronavirus. Would an "ill man" be better? A man
that has caught an illness.

We need to stop being offended so damn much. The society is getting softer and
more punishing to unintentional offenses.

Edit: LOL @ the superhero comment

