[smoody]

a friend of a good friend of mine was brutally raped by an independent Lincoln Town Car licensed driver (in NYC). I would advise (my personal opinion) women to avoid such services and deal with the hassle of getting a cab. Getting into a stranger's car and closing the door behind you is an action that should not be taken lightly. That is why I always take a taxi or use a well-established car service (as in substantial with a fleet of cars) instead of trusting someone who is able to drive you around because he/she filled out an application and leased a fancy black car. At least there is some accountability with taxi and fleet drivers. And unless UberCab does serious due dilligence on their drivers (perhaps they do?), I would stay away from this service (again, if I were a woman).

Edit: Please note that I do not mean to imply that all car drivers are bad people. I am confident that the majority of them are good, honest people trying to make a living the best way they can.

[mechanical_fish]

This article has to be read very carefully. Near the beginning it says:

UberCab contracts with black car services – mostly Towncars and Escalades

That suggests that they are probably doing some due diligence.

My friends the management consultants report that they use these black-car services all the time. You think a business traveler with a big expense account hails one of those yellow cabs, like me and the rest of the plebes? ;)

The follow-up idea of dispatching cab traffic to any random idiot with a Lincoln Town Car, an iPhone, and a possible drug problem seems to be Arrington's idea. It is, as you point out, a pretty lousy idea. [1] But don't blame UberCab.

---

[1] I should know. I had this idea five years ago. Then I conducted a thirty-minute thought experiment and decided that the due diligence would be annoying and not my cup of tea.

[grandalf]

It seems that the rating system might have prevented this... maybe others thought the driver was "creepy", etc. and might have given him/her a bad rating, which might have dissuaded your friend from choosing his/her car.

[yummyfajitas]

Certainly the fact that the driver is completely traceable (more so than a yellow cab driver) would dissuade most criminally inclined cabbies.

[sprout]

I don't think you're at all correct that they are less traceable than yellow cab drivers. The government bureaucracy makes it much more difficult to fake credentials and make yourself untraceable.

With UberCab, it looks like anyone could steal an iPhone/credit card, download the app, and sign up as a driver all in the space of an hour.

[yummyfajitas]

I think you wrote "less" when you mean "more". Assuming that's what you meant, I disagree. From their website, it looks as if UberCab requires drivers to be a livery company, so gov credentials are required either way.

The only way I can see the stolen iphone game working is if you steal the iphone from an UberCab driver, or convince UberCab that you are an independent livery and then rape someone before the stolen iphone gets cut off.

In contrast, a legitimate yellow cabbie just needs to put his coat on top of the taxi license and make sure the victim doesn't see his license plate # as he drives away. That same game won't work with a legitimate UberCabbie, since there is an electronic record that driver X picked up passenger Y.

[grandalf]

True. I think it's common for the owner of a medallion to let someone else drive the car illegally.

[tlrobinson]

Well, with ubercab you have a record of who the driver and passenger are before you even step into a cab. I can't tell you the last time I bothered to look at a cab number or license.

[lionhearted]

Also - learn martial arts. I took Krav Maga, there were plenty of women in the class, and the techniques translate well to self defense even if you're not as big or strong as your assailant. They teach you to attack vulnerable areas - eyes and groin in particular - and how to break chokes, deal with someone trying to pick you up off the ground, things like that. Everyone who travels or otherwise has a not 100% safe routine should take 10-20 martial arts classes. Might save your life.

Edit: Can't resist an anecdote. There was a huge Russian instructor in one of our classes, and the class that day was about half women. He said, "Ok, man tries to rape you? Rip his eyes, like this. See? Rip! He can't see now for rest of life? Tough shit! Should not have tried rape you."

(Despite the machismo of how this might look in text, it was well received in person - a good community, good people, good training, very welcoming to everyone at any level of age or fitness. Definitely recommended, almost any studio will give you a free class so just google for your area and go take one. Really, it's awesome.)

[mturmon]

It used to be standard advice in women's self-defense classes (e.g., http://modelmugging.org/) to avoid at all costs being coerced into a vehicle. Being in a vehicle with an assailant was said to lower your odds of escaping considerably.