Uber offers COVID-19 contact tracing service

Uber Technologies told Reuters it has quietly launched a service to give public health officials quick access to data on drivers and riders presumed to have come into contact with someone infected with COVID-19.

Fred Katayama reports.

Uber has been quietly sharing data on drivers and riders with public health officials trying to trace the spread of the novel coronavirus.

Company officials told Reuters the newly-designed data portal is meant for exclusive use by health departments, which can be searched by passenger names.

The service is being offered for free, and Uber received some 560 coronavirus-related data requests from health departments in 29 countries in the first half of 2020.

Uber’s chief law enforcement liaison told Reuters he’d received an increase in tracing requests from countries that proved initially successful in curbing COVID-19 transmission, such as Australia and New Zealand.

In the U.S., there is no national tracing strategy, forcing local health departments to take on the task.

Uber has tried to market itself as an essential service amid the pandemic, chauffeuring front-line aid workers to hospitals.

It recently launched an ad campaign spotlighting its “No Mask, No Ride,” policy in the Untied States.