Uber says 3,045 sexual assaults involving drivers and passengers reported in U.S. rides last year

Women and girls, Uber at your own risk.

In its first safety report released tonight, Uber disclosed the number of sexual assaults, murders and fatal crashes that happened through its ride-sharing platform.

Uber says 3,045 sexual assaults involving Uber drivers and passengers were reported in U.S. rides just last year.

Here's the official report in the Uber newsroom, which came out a few hours ago:

Uber Delivers U.S. Safety Report
Written byTony West, Chief Legal Officer

Doing the right thing means counting, confronting, and taking action to end sexual assault. My heart is with every survivor of this all-too-pervasive crime. Our work will never be done, but we take an important step forward today. https://t.co/i8W1fpiU97 (1/3)

— dara khosrowshahi (@dkhos) December 5, 2019

Today @Uber does what no other tech company has done: voluntarily publish a Safety Report detailing our greatest challenges and how we’re addressing them. Avoiding tough topics like sexual assault is common but we believe it’s time for a new approach.https://t.co/qFqKAlwcY5

— Tony West (@tonywest) December 5, 2019

Thanks for reaching out about the US Safety Report, @MitchGayns. Our Uber Support team isn’t able to answer questions directly, but you can learn more here: https://t.co/aVfEGlNZmV. If you’re interested in Uber’s overall approach to safety, see more at https://t.co/ckryXGfD7m.

— Uber Support (@Uber_Support) December 6, 2019

“The numbers are jarring and hard to digest,” Tony West, Uber’s chief legal officer, said in an interview with the New York Times' Kate Conger. “What it says is that Uber is a reflection of the society it serves.”

Excerpt from the NYT:

The report covered the safety of both riders and drivers. Murder victims were drivers, passengers and third parties. In cases of rape, Uber said, 92 percent of the reported victims were riders. But drivers reported other types of sexual assaults at roughly the same rate as riders, Uber said.

The company was not specific about who the perpetrators were.

Uber said it had cataloged 2,936 sexual assaults in 2017 and 3,045 in 2018, ranging from unwanted kissing of what it called a “nonsexual body part” to attempted rape and rape. The largest category was nonconsensual touching of a “sexual body part” like someone’s mouth or genitals.

As Noah Shachtman rightly said, how exactly do you justify taking an Uber after this? This woman can't.

Responses from around the internet tonight.

This makes other women apprehensive about taking Uber right https://t.co/1mZ2H5GrtP

— Bethany S. Mandel (@bethanyshondark) December 5, 2019

Previously: Uber tries to convince us that thousands of customer service complaints with the word “rape” in them are inflated because of people with names like “don draper” https://t.co/5F65k23Cbi https://t.co/qOVBTHjXcJ

— John Paczkowski (@JohnPaczkowski) December 5, 2019

How do you justify taking an @Uber after this? https://t.co/rJFMfTtpXz

— Noah Shachtman (@NoahShachtman) December 5, 2019

If you don’t measure something you can’t improve it. Glad to see @uber releasing the data publicly for sexual assaults.

Most tech companies would bury difficult information, like they do with the number of women they hire for engineering roles.https://t.co/xiqZLC2oUC

— Brianna Wu (@BriannaWu) December 6, 2019

These numbers are just astounding... now combine this with the company's history of undermining and investigating rape victims. Maybe think twice about getting into an Uber by yourself? https://t.co/uLXYMBpzBb

— DHH (@dhh) December 5, 2019

uber ceo letter to staff on the reporthttps://t.co/m88ZcPl4rR pic.twitter.com/zQ8n0HcEJK

— rat king (@MikeIsaac) December 6, 2019

These are horrible numbers but also reflective of the imperfect and extremely violent world we live in. I'm encouraged that they reported this and we can have a conversation about what it means. https://t.co/S12qNC16yo

— Ed Bott (@edbott) December 6, 2019

I'm surprised at the outrage at Uber. Do you know how many people are raped and murdered by taxi drivers around the world? What if Uber is 10X safer than getting into a taxi? https://t.co/UdQTpsel1i

— Marcelo Calbucci (@calbucci) December 6, 2019

Uber and Lyft gotta figure something out to keep women passengers safe

I hope their PR teams don’t try the “it’s only 3000 sexual assaults out of millions of rides” it ain’t gonna work.

— BIGNOAH (@BIGNOAH256) December 6, 2019

Absolutely awful. Yes, the problem of predatory taxi drivers predates Uber. But the scale here is sickening https://t.co/Vo5qcDCNkd

— Casey Newton (@CaseyNewton) December 5, 2019

OMG! Boycott this company:
“In a lengthy report, which divides sexual misconduct into 21 categories, Uber said it recorded 235 rapes and thousands more cases of assault.” https://t.co/guZR1SPcT8

— Amy Siskind (@Amy_Siskind) December 5, 2019

Last year I dug into the on-the-job harassment women Uber/Lyft drivers face -- and the impact it has on their paycheck. I spoke to women who faced frequent harassment and even assault from male passengers. @QuickTake @business https://t.co/vAiUad3coC

— Selina Wang (@selinawangtv) December 6, 2019