Uber deploys safety features for drivers, passengers

NEW YORK – Uber aims to enhance the safety of drivers and passengers to restore confidence in the brand.

The transport company has created a feature on its application to reach passengers and drivers if it detects an accident or an unexpected stop. Drivers will also have access to a hands-free feature to take passengers without touching their phones, and they will no longer see detailed data where they have retrieved passengers in the past.

"This is just the beginning of the trip for Uber," CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said Wednesday as the company introduced new features in New York. "We want Uber to be the safest transportation platform on the planet."

Uber plans to use location data to determine if a stop seems unusual because there is no traffic or if a car has not arrived at its final destination. If there is a prolonged and unexpected stop during a trip, the rider and the driver will receive a driving verification notification to ask if all is well.

The company has also added a button to its application that allows drivers to contact emergency services, similar to the one it created for passengers in March. Uber says that using the button is more effective than calling 911 because the Uber app contains the exact position of the vehicle.

Moving forward, Uber will hide specific pickup and delivery addresses in the driver's trip history, so that only the area where a trip has begun and finished is displayed on the driver application, and not the address.

Khosrowshahi has made security one of his top priorities since joining the company as a CEO a year ago.

In April, Uber began doing criminal background checks on US drivers and hired a company to continuously monitor criminal arrests. These measures are aimed at repairing Uber's reputation after a wave of major scandals and bad press.

About two weeks after the start of Khosrowshahi, London's transport regulator decided to remove Uber's license to operate, saying the company was likely to endanger public safety. Khosrowshahi apologized, flew to London to meet the officials and promised to change. A court finally granted a license to Uber, although much shorter than normal, so that it could be evaluated.