Uber Partners SafetiPin to Provide Safety Scores for City Locations

Aimed at ensuring better safety of its riders, taxi service firm Uber has partnered SafetiPin, a map-based mobile safety app, to generate a safety score for various locations in a city.

Uber will pilot the initiative in New Delhi, beginning February 25 and run for five months, following which it will be rolled out across other global markets, including Bogota, Colombia and Nairobi, Kenya with the aim to cover about 20,000 km of city roads and areas.

"Uber will advance the contribution to SafetiPin's data collection efforts across the city by providing access to partner-drivers and their cars," Uber said in a statement.

These partner-drivers, based at different locations in the city, will be trained and work at night with SafetiPin's safety auditors, it added.

The US-based cab-booking firm was banned by the Delhi Government in December last year following public outrage after one of its drivers allegedly raped a 26-year-old executive.

The company has undertaken a number of initiatives, including partnership with background-screening firm First Advantage and introduction of a panic button.

SafetiPin, a map-based mobile safety app, tags safety scores to locations on a map in a city based on safety audits done across the city.

Uber in its blog post says, "SafetiPin collects data of locations based on nine parameters that together contribute to the perception of safety by measuring actual location conditions in order to generate a safety score for an area. The information is supplemented with comments and photographs from real users and trained safety auditors. The data collected will also be shared with city governments for urban planning and safety campaigns for safer travels around the city."

Written with inputs from PTI