Digital Forensics Dispatch

Cities Want Access to Your Scooter Location

April 30, 2019

The Los Angeles Department of Transportation has begun its push to collect trip data from third-party companies who provide dockless bikes and e-scooter rentals.

City mobility has increased in the recent years with the introduction of dockless bikes and e-scooters. As part of the implementation of additional mobility options, LADOT (Los Angeles Department of Transportation) has proposed new regulations for the transportation methods. LADOT is requesting third-party rental companies provide up to the minute trip data for its fleet of bikes and scooters. The information collected can include a user’s home, work and travel behavior.

LADOT’s reasoning for gathering the requested information is to help aid safety concerns, manage sidewalk clutter and to ensure a wide availability of scooters across communities.

However, these policies have some companies concerned about the need for the information collected. Ridesharing services such as Uber and Lyft, who have recently began including scooters and bikes in their fleets, wrote a letter to LADOT leaders explaining their concern about who will have access to the data and more specific examples of what the acquired data would be used for. There are additional concerns that the data collected could potentially pinpoint user identities.

Companies have requested a delay on the regulations until a “formal, inclusive process to improve the policy and prioritize customer privacy has been undertaken.” Will users be able to request or get a copy of the collected information? It certainly isn’t far-fetched to see this becoming another potential source of data to obtain in personal injury, divorce or criminal cases moving forward.

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