Ride Hailing Company Ordered to Guarantee Safety

Guangming Daily August 28

A 20-year-old woman was raped and killed by a driver on August 24 after using Didi Chuxing’s carpool services. This is the second passenger murdered by a Didi driver in recent months following the killing of a flight attendant in Zhengzhou, central China’s Henan Province, in May. The Ministry of Transport and the Ministry of Public Security ordered Didi Chuxing—one of the leading ride hailing companies in China— to overhaul its business and the company has suspended its carpool services.

The case has exposed loopholes in Didi’s management, as a complaint was filed against the driver by a passenger the previous day who alleged that the driver had demanded she sit in the front seat multiple times, driven to a remote area and followed her after she got out of the car. However, the complaint was not dealt with in time. In addition, Didi’s monitoring system failed to detect that the driver had steered away from the set route.

Although Didi has conducted the screening of drivers’ criminal records and used a facial recognition system to make sure the driver and the car match, it needs to do more. For example, it should evaluate after-service and emergency complaints and deal with the latter in a more urgent manner.

It should also raise alerts about complaints involving personal assault by drivers and freeze the drivers’ accounts when necessary.

Moreover, the company should strengthen cooperation with the police because timely action by law enforcement can effectively curb criminal activities.