Uber Gives Cities Free Travel-Time Data (usatoday.com) 26
Uber is now "leveraging anonymous GPS information from hundreds of thousands of online Uber vehicles" using a new tool called Uber Movement. An anonymous reader quotes USA Today:
Uber is going to make urban traffic and mobility data gleaned from its millions of drivers and riders using the Uber app freely available to all. The data, which shows anonymized travel times between points in cities, will be available on a public website called Uber Movement. Uber says it will first invite planning agencies and researchers to access the information and then make the website free to the public... The San Francisco-based company decided to release the data when it realized it had "this very valuable but untapped resource for understanding a city's transportation infrastructure," said Andrew Salzberg, Uber's head of transportation policy...
Pegged to a transportation conference in DC on Sunday, the release is also likely is a bid to gain some goodwill with cities, with which Uber has often had bare-knuckled fights over regulation... Uber Movement doesn't map individuals rides, but rather segments of rides, focusing on travel time between specific points... The Uber data will give cities a low-cost way to do high-resolution travel time analysis
Boston's chief information officer says the new tool "gives people tools to ask us questions. That's really powerful."
Pegged to a transportation conference in DC on Sunday, the release is also likely is a bid to gain some goodwill with cities, with which Uber has often had bare-knuckled fights over regulation... Uber Movement doesn't map individuals rides, but rather segments of rides, focusing on travel time between specific points... The Uber data will give cities a low-cost way to do high-resolution travel time analysis
Boston's chief information officer says the new tool "gives people tools to ask us questions. That's really powerful."
Free time travel data? (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:1)
She's dumping you and aborting your parasite.
Damnit, did they share time travel information from next year also?
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"This video is unlisted. Be considerate and think twice before sharing." GG, howd ya find it?
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Hopefully that address in the video is where someone just plopped down an arrow, and not an indication of the endpoint of any one ride from the dataset...
What can go wrong? (Score:2)
Some thoughts (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Like any good drug dealer, the first taste is free. EG: Uber gave it away this time, but wait until the hook is set and then they will charge for it. I wouldn't mind if Uber either gave me a discount or let me opt out. Yeah, that's not gonna happen.
2. Anonymous today, meta-data tomorrow if not yesterday. Big data is just another way to say Big Brother.
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I don't really see a strong reason to let passengers opt out. By stepping foot in the car, you know, by definition, that Uber is receiving GPS data from the route. It's how they bill you. What they do with that data is up to their EUTOS which I imagine is pretty broad.
You're the passenger in their contractor's (their definition...open for argument) car...might as well tell the FAA that they need your permission to track the route of the plane while you're on it.
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By similar logic, your doctor should be allowed to sell all your health information. After all, he needs to know your health details in order to treat you and you agree to his terms of service by walking in the door.
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Don't fool yourself, your health data is already being sold. (I was a database server administrator at a large hospital)
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Your Anonymized Health Care Data is already available and HIPAA Compliant.
https://www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-professionals/privacy/laws-regulations/index.html [hhs.gov]
There are no restrictions on the use or disclosure of de-identified health information. De-identified health information neither identifies nor provides a reasonable basis to identify an individual.
I don't see this as being any different.
Actually it is different: they are not tracking YOU, they are tracking the UBER driver's car.
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Bandits give king free road conditions report. (Score:1)
They're still bandits.
And the king should still hang them when he catches them.