The kill switch, which blocked access to the company’s servers, was deployed several times in at least six countries, namely France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Hungary, India, and Romania. The move prevented authorities from gathering crucial information that could have been used to regulate the company’s operations and prosecute drivers. In January 2018, Bloomberg reported that Uber had used a kill switch named Ripley between 2015 and 2016 in countries such as Canada and Hong Kong. However, the leaked files show that the kill switch was used in many other countries.
What Is in the Leaked Uber Files?
The leaked Uber files contain over 124,000 confidential documents, including over 83,000 emails, iMessages, and WhatsApp messages. The documents detail some of the company’s ethically questionable strategies during its aggressive global expansion. In particular, it covers the tactics used during the five-year reign of the company’s co-founder Travis Kalanick. According to The Guardian, the leaked files include some “frank and unvarnished” exchanges between Kalanick and top Uber executives. The files show that the company’s executives were aware of the law-breaking nature of their actions. “Leaked messages suggest Uber executives were at the same time under no illusions about the company’s law-breaking, with one executive joking they had become “pirates” and another conceding: “We’re just fucking illegal,”” The Guardian wrote.
How Uber Used Its Kill Switch
The leaked files show that Uber deployed its kill switch at least 12 times in France. The earliest mention of the kill switch comes from two raids in France back in 2014. On November 17, 2014, French officials raided Uber’s offices in Paris. However, the company was already on high alert following a raid on its Lyon office just three days earlier. “In a message sent at 3.14pm, apparently after the raid had begun, De Kievit emailed an Uber IT engineer in Denmark, saying: “Please kill access now,” copying in executives including Kalanick and Gore-Coty, who ran Uber’s operations in western Europe,” The Guardian stated. “Thirteen minutes later, the technician wrote back, confirming the procedure was “done now.”” The company’s top brass sent similar emails in response to raids in Belgium and the Netherlands. The raid on Uber’s Belgium office took place in March 2015. In that instance, officials did not give local staff the opportunity to communicate with Uber executives. An email from MacGann to David Plouffe, Uber’s head of policy and strategy, showed that the incident caused Uber to improve its preparedness against potential raids. Going forward, the company cut access to IT tools—even for high-level executives—during raids.
What Is a Kill Switch?
A kill switch is a mechanism that shuts off a system when something goes wrong. A lot of devices have kill switches, including heavy machines and computer systems. Heavy machines have kill switches to stop them from operating when they go out of control. Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) have somewhat different kill switches that block your access to the internet when your VPN connection drops. In computer systems, a kill switch can make data inaccessible or even delete it. Uber reportedly developed its kill switch in response to frequent raids by law enforcement in different regions. In 2018, an Uber spokesperson described the kill switch as part of the company’s “security procedures in place to protect corporate and customer data.” However, executives at Uber instructed regional IT staff to use the kill switch to cut off access to the company’s global network during police raids. The leaked documents show that Kalanick and Zac de Kievit, Uber’s former legal director in Europe, told IT staff to hit the kill switch.
Uber No Longer Uses Kill Switch
After the Bloomberg report in 2018, Uber revealed that it no longer uses its kill switch. The company reaffirmed this to The Guardian after the latest revelation, saying it stopped using the kill switch after Dara Khosrowshahi replaced Kalanick as CEO in 2017. An Uber spokesperson told the British news outlet that the software “should never have been used to thwart legitimate regulatory action.” In a statement, Jill Hazelbaker, Uber’s SVP of marketing and public affairs, said Khosrowshahi was hired to transform “every aspect of how Uber operates.” “When we say Uber is a different company today, we mean it literally: 90 percent of current Uber employees joined after Dara became CEO,” Hazelbaker said. “We’ve moved from an era of confrontation to one of collaboration, demonstrating a willingness to come to the table and find common ground with former opponents, including labor unions and taxi companies. We are now regulated in more than 10,000 cities around the world…,” she said. Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Kalanick told The Guardian that Uber’s kill switch was not used to obstruct justice in any country. She added that Kalanick had never been charged in any jurisdiction for “obstruction of justice or any related offence.”
