China’s Didi Chuxing started now records in-car audio during passenger rides

Taxi-hailing
app Didi controls around 90 per cent of the Chinese
market.
Simon
Song

• Didi Chuxing, China’s largest ride-hailing
  company, is now recording in-car audio during passenger trips
  in an effort it says will improve customer safety.
• Users must agree to have their ride recorded for the
  duration of the trip, or else they cannot book. 
• Some users have expressed concern that the new safety
  measures are an invasion of privacy. 
• The recording policy also raises questions about
  widespread surveillance that takes place in China as part of
  its “social credit system.”

Didi Chuxing, China’s largest ride-hailing company, is now
recording in-car audio during passenger trips in an effort that
it says will improve customer safety.

The company, most recently valued at
$50 billion, began trialing the new feature on one of its
platforms, Didi Hitch, on Saturday, which asks users for a
one-time authorization to create a voice recording for the
duration of their rides before they’re able to book a car. If
they decline, the booking cannot be completed. 

A message on the app says recording is done on the driver’s
phone, and recordings will be uploaded to the company’s servers
as an encrypted file only accessible by Didi or law-enforcement.
According to the message, the recording will be used as evidence
in dealing with complaints or bad reviews, and will be
automatically deleted within seven days if a complaint is not
filed. 

In July, the app tested out an optional video recording
function in 20 cities, which asked users if they wanted to be
recorded when they entered into a vehicle equipped with a
camera. 

The company has also rolled out
driver facial recognition software before each trip, limited
late-night rides to
drivers and passengers of the same sex, and announced it
would temporarily be suspending late night services on the app
from September 8 while the company evaluates risks and continues
to make improvements. 

The increased safety measures follow two high-profile murders
that happened during Didi rides in the last several months.

Last month, a 20-year-old woman was allegedly raped and murdered
by a driver after using the service in the eastern province of
Zhejiang, and in May, a 21-year-old flight attendant raped and
murdered in Zhengzhou by an unregistered driver who
allegedly hijacked his father’s account.

Public records seen by the
South China Morning Post indicate that the service had at
least a dozen instances of sexual assault convictions involving
drivers and passengers.

Users are worried about being monitored

Wang
He/Getty Images

Some users have expressed concern that the new safety measures
are an invasion of privacy. 

“This is sacrificing privacy for safety,” one user wrote on
popular microblogging platform Weibo, according to
Sixth Tone. “Why can’t [Didi] let passengers make their own
choice?”

“We can’t talk about work and life during a journey after this,”
a Didi passenger told Global
Times. “I feel that both the driver and passenger are being
monitored.” 

The new measures also raise wider concerns about surveillance of
Chinese citizens as they go about their daily lives. 

China has already announced plans for a mandatory “social
credit system” to be rolled out by 2020, which ranks citizens
behavior and “trustworthiness” by monitoring most things about
people — from their spending habits, to their internet use, to
traffic violations.

Good social credit can lead to preferential treatment when
renting apartments, staying in hotels, or getting a job
promotion. But a poor score could result in
travel bans, lower internet speeds, limited job prospects, or
even public shaming.

The methodology of how China cultivates the score remains
foggy, though the country could be using widespread facial
recognition technology, monitoring online messages, forcing
citizens to download government-linked monitoring apps, and
tracking citizens’ social media posts. 

The credit system has been rolled out in dozens of cities across
the country, and citizens are already witnessing the effects of
state monitored surveillance from
suspended university enrollment, to
banned travel access. 

Several popular apps have been found to record sensitive user
data stored in their mobile devices, which could be used to track
and monitor Chinese citizens, according to
Hong Kong Free Press. And Chinese authorities have
acknowledged they have
accessed deleted conversations from the popular messaging app
WeChat.

Still, when it comes to ensuring safety, users in Chinese
citizens are among the most willing to sacrifice privacy for
safety and convenience, according to a
report by market research firms Experian and
International Data Corporation.