There is a loophole in the drivers’ side of ridesharing apps in that presenting profile images is like how it works on social where you can practically upload any type of image you desire, even those that don’t look like a passport image, or unprofessional. And drivers in China are seeing an opportunity to turn this into a, scam. Here’s the scoop.
Scary profile pictures
Some Uber drivers in China are intentionally using unsettling profile pictures, so people will, of course, be led to cancel those rides, so the drivers can collect cancellation fees. As to whether this is a syndicate is yet to be seen.
A certain content on Instagram detailed these stuff, saying, “In 2016, Uber drivers in China discovered a loophole so simple and so brilliantly stupid that it spread across the entire country within weeks. If a passenger cancels a ride after a certain amount of time, the driver collects a cancellation fee. The drivers figured out that instead of actually driving people around, they could just make passengers cancel on their own by making their profile photos as deeply unsettling as humanly possible."
The images that some drivers use include distorted faces, stretched images, eyes in the wrong places, mouths open in silent screams, and pictures that seem to come straight from a horror movie. It’s really like an advanced celebration of Halloween.
"At peak points, some drivers were reportedly running this scam dozens of times per day across multiple fake accounts. No driving required. Just one truly horrifying profile photo and an unlimited supply of passengers who did not want to find out if the person behind that face was real,” the post added.
What’s worse, the “ghost drivers” were not fake accounts, but real drivers who are using a loophole to their advantage, which is a double-whammy, since another loophole is getting the passengers to cancel the ride so they can collect the cancellation charges.
Uber’s statement
Uber responded to Chinese ridesharing media, saying it has zero-tolerance attitude to these scamming behaviors, saying that it has rolled out a working face-recognition technology in China to curb fraud, and is also issuing refunds to passengers duped, affected, and victimized.
“Uber eventually caught on and started requiring verified ID photos for driver profiles. The ghost drivers disappeared almost overnight. But for a brief window in 2016, somewhere in China, a group of people discovered that the most profitable thing they could do with a car was never use it and just look as terrifying as possible. Genuinely one of the most creative scams ever run,” Uber said. "We have taken immediate actions and banned these reported individual fraud accounts while continuing to investigate and crack down on any fraudulent behavior to protect rider and driver interests.”
This scamming was reported in several Chinese cities, such as Shanghai, Beijing, Tianjin, Qingdao, Chengdu, and Suzhou. For more ridesharing reports, keep it locked right here on Ridesharing Forum.