Uber South Africa is enhancing its safety and security by adding a function that allows customers and drivers to record their travels for the sake of evidence collecting.
Business Insider reports that the e-hailing service will deploy the function on September 8 in Johannesburg and Pretoria. In the following four weeks, it will roll out the safety feature to the remainder of the nation, with intentions to eventually extend to Sub-Saharan Africa.
The new audio recording technology is part of Uber’s Safety Toolkit and has been a hit in Latin America and the United States since its introduction a few years ago.
With the technology, both passengers and drivers will be able to record the journey and submit their recordings in the event that an issue has been reported.
“Riders and drivers will be aware that this feature is available to the other but will not know when the feature is being used,” Uber said.
General Manager for Uber Sub-Saharan Africa, Kagiso Khaole, told ITWeb that with safety and crime being a huge concern in SA, their commitment to raising the bar on safety remains relentless.
“We believe that this feature will improve the conduct of users of the Uber app, as drivers and riders hold each other accountable every step of the way.
“Verbal altercations, sexual misconduct and other violations can be difficult to investigate without evidence; however, we are confident that this new feature will assist Uber in adjudicating such incidents to ensure that the appropriate action is taken,” he explains.
This feature comes a week after Uber’s food delivery service, Uber Eats, halted operations in Soweto, Gauteng, due to safety concerns. And Khoale says that the new feature is one that drivers have been asking for.
In addition, Khaole said the audio file is encrypted and stored on your devices for up to 15 days. The feature works by allowing users to press the shield icon on the app and select “record audio”,
“We do not have access to it, we can’t see what’s being recorded. Let’s say for example later on you decice actually that was really bizarre… you go back to your trips and submit it to us. The recording is stored for about 15 days on your device, then it’s automatically deleted,” he said.