Uber lobbied world leaders and used “stealth” technology to deflect scrutiny from investigators as ride-sharing mounted a campaign to overcome resistance in many cities and win the world, new reports based on filtered logs to reveal.
The records, known as Uber Files, were obtained by the UK Guardian Newspaper and shared with the International Consortium for Investigative Journalism (ICIJ) and 42 media partners. According to the ICIJ, they contain emails, text messages, company presentations and other documents from 2013 to 2017, when Uber stormed cities in defiance of local laws and regulations, dodging taxes and seeking to largely replace local taxi models.
The documents reveal the inside story of Uber’s global expansion, how they approached leaders including French President Emmanuel Macron, who was the country’s economy minister at the time, and how the company used an “off switch.” when trying to prevent investigators from gaining access. sensitive data during raids. In many cases, Uber defied local taxi laws and upended workers’ rights.
The files show that the company used technological smokescreens to thwart investigators in the Netherlands, Belgium, Russia, Bulgaria, Denmark, Spain and other countries. The tactics in question included giving authorities a fake version of its app to call ghost cars that never came and “blocked geofences,” which rendered the app useless in some places, including near police stations in Denmark. .
The leaked communications also show how founder Travis Kalanick, who was in charge for the five years under review, personally directed the use of aggressive tactics during the company’s international expansion. They show that Kalanick saw the possibility of violence against Uber drivers in France as an opportunity to build public support, and personally ordered the use of the kill switch during a raid in Amsterdam.
The report says some Uber executives discussed leaking details of a near-fatal stabbing and other brutal attacks to the media in hopes of drawing negative attention to the taxi industry, the communications show.
To spread its message, Uber, with the help of an advisory firm, compiled lists of more than 1,850 “stakeholders” — current and former public officials, think tanks and citizen groups — that it sought to influence in 29 countries. , as well as in institutions of the European Union, are shown in the documents.
The company also recruited a battalion of former government officials, including many former advisers to President Barack Obama.
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They called on public officials to drop investigations, change policies on workers’ rights, write new taxi laws and relax background checks on drivers.
Uber in a statement by Jill Hazelbaker, its senior vice president of marketing and public affairs, admitted “mistakes” in the past, but insisted the company had transformed since 2017 under the leadership of its new CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi. “We have not and will not make excuses for past behavior that is clearly not in line with our current values,” the spokesman said.
Uber said CEO Khosrowshahi, hired in 2017, was tasked with transforming every aspect of how Uber operates.
“When we say that Uber is a different company today, we mean it literally: 90% of current Uber employees joined after Dara became CEO,” the firm said.