Uber is piloting smartphone tech to track speeding drivers

“If a rider complains that a driver accelerated too fast and broke too hard, we can review that trip using data”, Uber explains. For drivers, it means that unwarranted complaints won’t ding their rating, and for passengers, it might make them more comfortable using Uber more often. The company already asks passengers to rate their drivers after each ride – and vice versa – and talks to both parties if the rating is low.

Uber has been running a pilot program that uses smartphone data to verify rider feedback and catch potentially unsafe drivers.

Part of the reason why Uber is so popular is because of its feedback system.

News of the pilot program was first reported in the Guardian newspaper. Whether it’s checking to see if the driver is checking his phone too much during the ride or it’s measuring how fast the driver is going, Uber believes that this move can help them assess which of their drivers are being rated fairly and which ones may be getting a bad rap.

Drivers are made aware of the tracking if a complaint has been made against them, Uber said. It might be that a driver is unhappy about an unruly rider.

“And if it’s not, we could use the information to make sure a driver’s rating isn’t affected”, he added.

It was only a matter of time until Uber tapped into the wealth of sensors available within smartphones to keep tabs on drivers, and today it’s confirmed that it’s testing exactly that.

Since it collects this data, if a user complains about a driver, the company can look to this data to see a more complete picture of how the drive was conducted. Drivers in Seattle and North Carolina have cleverly thrown them in the back seat of their vehicles so that late night passengers, can bat them around like a gaggle of stoned kittens, allowing the driver to focus on the road.