It doesn't change anything, but as the Uber engineer above lists, they have rational reasons for wanting it.
I just don't have any rational reason to want to give it to them, so I'll be disabling GPS entirely. But I've mostly stopped using them anyway - the scummy corporate behavior bugged me, but not enough to boycott. And then a driver nearly physically attacked me over, as best I can tell, mishearing something (although I'm not really sure). Those combined, along with a general dislike of the gig economy and I've already mostly ditched them - Uber feels somewhere between sketchy and icky to me. Used them once in the last ~6 months, when the Lyft app forgot my password and it was late.
They let me not let them. Lyft lets me tell iOS to share my location with it only "while using the app". Uber used to do this. But now that option has disappeared--it's only "always" or "never".
You don't know until someone investigates, obviously. But if you have to choose between an app that definitely does that and an app that might do it, it makes sense to use the one that might in the meantime.
There's an opportunity for Lyft to be "Uber, but for not scummy business practises" here, but I suppose most users don't really care. Austin would have been a good test of that, but Lyft withdrew along with Uber.
Lyft, sadly, doesn't seem to have the talent it needs to pull this off. Although they're still worth something, it just doesn't seem like Lyft will be able to eke it out unless something really game-changing happens to Uber.
I've been a longtime Lyft user because of the stories that surfaced a few years ago about Uber considering blackmailing reporters and politicians with their ride data, but the last time I had to use the app, Lyft for some reason just wasn't working - their auth service seemed to be broken. I ended up downloading Uber and signing up because I had to get somewhere in a hurry and didn't have the time to look up another rideshare service. Their text notifications about driver arrivals are also always off, on the order of up to a minute or two (I don't know if Uber is better, but I would assume it is.)
FWIW, I'd also sunk something like $300 into Lyft rides just two weeks before that for business travel, and I didn't experience a problem once.
Lyft engineer here, so bear in mind any bias, but we take account and data privacy very seriously, and have a data privacy team which focuses on these kind of issues.
From where I stand, we have great engineering and product talent. Perception is tricky - I see that we're very agile with (sometimes far) fewer resources, from the view I have.
I'd be glad to dig into the auth issues you ran into if you're able to ping privately with a few more details.
On iOS at least - the (current versipon of the) Lytf app specifically asks " … to access you location while you use the app." Uber _used_ to have a "while using the app" location option, but the recent update took this away so you choice is either "Never" give it location info, or "Always".
I just don't have any rational reason to want to give it to them, so I'll be disabling GPS entirely. But I've mostly stopped using them anyway - the scummy corporate behavior bugged me, but not enough to boycott. And then a driver nearly physically attacked me over, as best I can tell, mishearing something (although I'm not really sure). Those combined, along with a general dislike of the gig economy and I've already mostly ditched them - Uber feels somewhere between sketchy and icky to me. Used them once in the last ~6 months, when the Lyft app forgot my password and it was late.