Uber suspends driver who live-streamed St. Louis passengers
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}FILE - In this March 15, 2017, file photo, a woman gets in an Uber car at LaGuardia Airport in New York. Startup SURE says it has partnered with underwriter Chubb to launch a new service that allows Uber and Lyft ride-hailing passengers to buy accidental medical, death and dismemberment insurance coverage for the ride. The program, called RideSafe, works by connecting a customer's Uber or Lyft account to their SURE Insurance app, and once coverage is initially authorized, the passenger's ride is automatically insured. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File) (Uber)
Ride-sharing company Uber has suspended a driver who recorded hundreds of St. Louis-area riders without their permission and streamed the live video online.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported 32-year-old Jason Gargac, of Florissant, Missouri, has given about 700 rides in the area since March. Almost all have been streamed to his channel on the live video website Twitch, where he goes by the username "JustSmurf."
The paper reported that some of the passengers included children and drunken college students.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Gargac said he is just trying to "capture the natural interactions between myself and the passengers."
But some riders said they felt their privacy had been violated. Of about a dozen the newspaper interviewed, all said they didn't know they were livestreamed and wouldn't have consented.
After the story's publication, Uber said it was suspending his use of the app due to "troubling behavior."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}One passenger told the paper, “I feel violated. I’m embarrassed. We got in an Uber at 2 a.m. to be safe, and then I find out that because of that, everything I said in that car is online and people are watching me. It makes me sick.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report