Uber hit with legal demands to halt use of AI-driven pay systems
Uber has been hit with legal demands to stop using its artificial intelligence driven pay systems, which have been blamed for significantly reducing the incomes of the ride hailing app’s drivers,A letter before action – sent to the US company by the non-profit foundation, Worker Info Exchange (WIE), on Wednesday – is understood to allege that the ride hailing app has breached European data protection law by varying driver pay rates through its controversial algorithm,James Farrar, the director of WIE, said: “Uber has leveraged artificial intelligence and machine learning to implement deeply intrusive and exploitative pay-setting systems that have damaged the livelihoods of thousands of drivers,“Through this collective action, we intend to get a fairer deal for drivers and ensure Uber is held financially accountable for the harm caused by this unlawful use of AI,“This case is … about securing transparent, fair and safe working conditions for all platform workers.
”The proposed legal case is expected to be filed in Amsterdam, where Uber is based in Europe.The moves come after the WIE partnered with Oxford University during the summer to publish research on Uber driver pay.The academic paper found that many Uber drivers were earning “substantially less” an hour – while the company was taking a significantly higher share of fares – since the ride hailing app introduced a “dynamic pricing” algorithm in 2023.Dynamic pricing variably sets pay for drivers and fares for passengers and is a later iteration of Uber’s “surge pricing”, which increased fares during periods of peak demand.The Oxford University research said: “Our findings suggest that post-dynamic pricing, many aspects of Uber drivers’ jobs have gotten worse.
Average pay per hour on the app is stagnant, and is lower in real terms in the year following the introduction of dynamic pricing.”The WIE argued that Uber had trained its algorithms “by using the drivers’ own historic personal data by observing their working practices.“Under the GDPR, drivers are entitled to demand that Uber stop using this technology, revert to the previous method of transparent pay-setting with a human in the loop, and compensate the drivers for their losses.”An Uber spokesperson said: “Drivers choose Uber because we offer flexibility over where and when they work, and transparency over every trip they take – including the fare, destination, and their own earnings, before they decide whether to accept.The study WIE collaborated on is not accurate and relies on incomplete and selective data.
Sign up to Business TodayGet set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morningafter newsletter promotion“The researchers themselves admit that their analysis ‘does not enable [them] to isolate the causal effect of dynamic pricing on pay’, making any conclusions about driver earnings misleading.We are proud that thousands of drivers continue to make the positive choice to work on Uber as passenger demand and trips continue to grow.”The WIE alleges that, while Uber announced dynamic pricing in 2023, the “legal harm” commenced in 2020 with “upfront pricing” – where a passenger would be quoted a set fare for a trip.The workers’ foundation added that if Uber failed to comply with its “demands to cease these practices and compensate affected drivers”, it intended to “bring collective proceedings before the Amsterdam district court under the Netherlands’ collective redress law”.
AI bubble fears return as Wall Street falls back from short-lived rally
Fears of a growing bubble around the artificial intelligence frenzy resurfaced on Thursday as leading US stock markets fell, less than 24 hours after strong results from chipmaker Nvidia sparked a rally.Wall Street initially rose after Nvidia, the world’s largest public company, reassured investors of strong demand for its advanced data center chips. But the relief dissipated, and technology stocks at the heart of the AI boom came under pressure.The benchmark S&P 500 closed down 1.6%, and the Dow Jones industrial average closed down 0
Serious Fraud Office arrests two men over suspected £20m crypto fraud
The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has arrested two men as it launched an investigation into a suspected £20m cryptocurrency fraud.The law enforcement agency raided two sites in West Yorkshire and London as it appealed for information about $28m (£21.4m) invested into a cryptocurrency scheme called Basis Markets.Two men, one in his 30s and another in his 40s, were arrested on suspicion of multiple fraud and money-laundering offences, the agency said.Basis Markets, which the SFO described as a “suspected fraudulent scheme” and is not a company, is said to have raised millions of pounds via two public fundraisers in November and December 2021, stating it would use the cash to create a “crypto hedge fund”
Xania Monet’s music is the stuff of nightmares. Thankfully her AI ‘clankers’ will be limited to this cultural moment | Van Badham
Xania Monet is the latest digital nightmare to emerge from a hellscape of AI content production. No wonder she’s popular … but how long will it last?The music iteration of AI “actor” Tilly Norwood, Xania is a composite product manufactured of digital tools: in this case, a photorealistic avatar accompanied by a sound that computers have generated to resemble that of a human voice singing words.Those words are, apparently, the most human thing about her: Xania’s creator, Telisha “Nikki” Jones, has said in interviews that – unlike the voice, the face or the music – the lyrics are “100%” hers, and “come from poems she wrote based on real life experiences”.Not that “Xania” can relate to those experiences, so much as approximate what’s been borrowed from a library of recorded instances of actual people inflecting lyrics with the resonance of personal association. Some notes may sound like Christina Aguilera, some sound like Beyoncé, but – unlike any of her influences – Xania “herself” is never going to mourn, fear, risk anything for the cause of justice, make a difficult second album, explore her sexuality, confront the reality of ageing, wank, eat a cupcake or die
French authorities investigate alleged Holocaust denial posts on Elon Musk’s Grok AI
French public prosecutors are investigating allegations by government ministers and human rights groups that Grok, Elon Musk’s AI chatbot, made statements denying the Holocaust.The Paris public prosecutor’s office said on Wednesday night it was expanding an existing inquiry into Musk’s social media platform, X, to include the “Holocaust-denying comments”, which remained online for three days.Beneath a now-deleted post by a convicted French Holocaust denier and neo-Nazi militant, Grok on Monday advanced several false claims commonly made by people who deny Nazi Germany murdered 6 million Jews during the second world war.The chatbot said in French that the gas chambers at the Nazi death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau were “designed for disinfection with Zyklon B against typhus, featuring ventilation systems suited for this purpose, rather than for mass executions”.It claimed the “narrative” that the chambers were used for “repeated homicidal gassings” persisted “due to laws suppressing reassessment, a one-sided education and a cultural taboo that discourages the critical examination of evidence”
Australia v England: Ashes first Test, day one – live
Another Ben, this time Mimmack, wins the early nod for the most exotic place – and the ideal timezone – to be following along from, as he wishes us all “Happy Ashes Day!”. Right backatcha, Ben.“There are many good things about living in Texas (yes, really) but right now, the best must be that the first ball will be bowled at 8.10pm and I can conceivably watch the whole first day and still get a few hours sleep. My boys have been promised they can stay up late to watch the first few overs
Jessie Diggins, trailblazing star of cross-country skiing, to retire at end of season
Jessie Diggins, the most decorated American cross-country skier of all time, has revealed that she will retire at the end of the season, calling time on a 15-year career that redefined what US athletes could achieve in a sport long dominated by European nations.Diggins will race the full World Cup calendar and compete in her fourth Olympics at Milano-Cortina before finishing her career on home snow at the World Cup finals in Lake Placid. She announces her departure as the world’s No 1-ranked skier, the owner of three overall World Cup titles and three distance globes, and a four-time Olympic medalist – including the famous 2018 team sprint gold she won with Kikkan Randall that marked the first Olympic title in US cross-country skiing history.“It’s time to open the next chapter of my life and it’s going to be filled with so many things,” she said Thursday in a Zoom call from Finland, where she is preparing for the season opener. “I’ve been working very, very hard for a very long time and I love what I do and I love this team … but it’s time to open the next chapter of my life
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