Experts: "Info gathered by ride-hailing apps could aid crime"

While many of us have gotten hooked to ride-hailing apps such as Uber, Taxify and Safe Boda, there are fears that the personal information we share with the app firms could be used to against us.

Technology experts say the information helps in creating a pattern which could be used by criminals to perpetrate crime.

Herbert Musoke, an app developer with Next Media, says that the same way it was easy to hack Facebook yet it had better security measures is the same way local apps can easily be hacked.

“The data stored is never really safe because if they were able to hack Face book one of the biggest cloud users that mean that no app is safe.”_Herbert Musoke

But Kirk Agbenyegal the chief technology officer Safe Boda, assured that the information gathered is encrypted and stored securely with a cloud service provider.

He said the storage is only accessible by top management officials who also have restricted access according to their needs for the service.

According to the police spokesperson, Emilian Kayima, police can only come up with measures to counter something if there is confirmation that a crime has been committed thanks to loopholes in an app.

Kayima also said that it is the responsibility of the app developers/owners to ensure the proper use of this data.

Cases of people hacking into ride- hailing apps have been reported in the US.

For instance, it was reported that hackers stole personal data including names, email addresses and phone numbers, as well as the names and driver’s license numbers of about 600,000 drivers in the United States in 2016.

The company said more sensitive information, such as location data, credit card numbers, bank account numbers, social security numbers, and birth dates, had not been compromised.