Skip to main content

Uber expands options for drivers, riders to opt out of men

By
The Uber app icon on a green phone background.

Uber is now offering its women-only safety feature, known as Women Preferences, to users nationwide.

First launched to pilot markets in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Detroit last July, the feature lets users and drivers select gender preferences for ride matches and schedule rides with women drivers. The setting is also available for Uber Teen Accounts.

SEE ALSO: Yet another state makes moves to end dynamic pricing

"Women Preferences was created because women asked for it," the company wrote in a March 9 blog post.

According to the company, Women Preferences has been used for 230 million rides since its launch. It's available for drivers in 40 countries and for riders in seven countries (the U.S., Germany, France, Saudi Arabia, Portugal, Brazil, and Spain).

Uber's competitor Lyft launched a similar feature connecting women and nonbinary riders to non-male drivers nearly two years earlier. Lyft expanded the Women+ Connect tool nationwide in 2024. Both companies have weathered complaints that the ride-sharing apps are not doing enough to address rider assaults.

Last month, Uber was found partially liable for sexual violence perpetrated by one of its drivers and ordered to pay more than $8 million in damages. Rider Jaylynn Dean sued the company after she was raped by a driver in 2023 and discovered the company hadn't notified her that her trip was flagged for a potential serious safety incident. Uber faces thousands of pending sexual assault and sexual misconduct lawsuits, according to the New York Times.

Meanwhile, male drivers have alleged that such safety features are a form of workplace gender discrimination. A group of ride-share employees recently filed several lawsuits claiming they have lost wages, arguing there are grounds for a class action lawsuit.



from Mashable https://ift.tt/ODHf7pj
via IFTTT
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Nintendo Switch has been the US’s bestselling console for 23 straight months

By
Photo by James Bareham / The Verge It’s been a good two years for the Nintendo Switch. According to Nintendo, the gaming tablet has been the bestselling console in the US for 23 straight months. And according to data from the NPD Group, it just had its best October ever, moving 735,926 units of both the Switch and Switch Lite in the US. The company says that represents a 136 percent increase compared to last year. To date, the Switch has sold 22.5 million units in the US, and last week Nintendo revealed that more than 68 million units have been sold globally . “We’re excited about our momentum,” says Nick Chavez, Nintendo of America’s SVP of sales and marketing. Chavez puts the company’s big October down to two main factors. One is a better supply of stock; this year in particular, it’s often been hard to find a Switch on store shelves. This has only been exacerbated by increased demand due to a combination of the pandemic and the breakout success of Animal Crossing: New Horizons . ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Instagram accidentally reinstated Pornhub’s banned account

By
After years of on-and-off temporary suspensions, Instagram permanently banned Pornhub’s account in September. Then, for a short period of time this weekend, the account was reinstated. By Tuesday, it was permanently banned again. “This was done in error,” an Instagram spokesperson told TechCrunch. “As we’ve said previously, we permanently disabled this Instagram account for repeatedly violating our policies.” Instagram’s content guidelines prohibit  nudity and sexual solicitation . A Pornhub spokesperson told TechCrunch, though, that they believe the adult streaming platform’s account did not violate any guidelines. Instagram has not commented on the exact reasoning for the ban, or which policies the account violated. It’s worrying from a moderation perspective if a permanently banned Instagram account can accidentally get switched back on. Pornhub told TechCrunch that its account even received a notice from Instagram, stating that its ban had been a mistake (that message itse...
Post a Comment
Read more

MVP versus EVP: Is it time to introduce ethics into the agile startup model?

By
Anand Rao Contributor Share on Twitter Anand Rao is global head of AI at PwC . The rocket ship trajectory of a startup is well known: Get an idea, build a team and slap together a minimum viable product (MVP) that you can get in front of users. However, today’s startups need to reconsider the MVP model as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) become ubiquitous in tech products and the market grows increasingly conscious of the ethical implications of AI augmenting or replacing humans in the decision-making process. An MVP allows you to collect critical feedback from your target market that then informs the minimum development required to launch a product — creating a powerful feedback loop that drives today’s customer-led business. This lean, agile model has been extremely successful over the past two decades — launching thousands of successful startups, some of which have grown into billion-dollar companies. However, building high-performing product...
Post a Comment
Read more