Shanghai traffic committee to push for release of taxi app user data

Shanghai traffic authorities said they will seek assistance from other government departments as they seek to force the owners of third-party taxi booking apps to release personal data about their users.

The Shanghai Transport Commission last month asked Kuaidi Taxi and Didi Taxi for the names, cellphone numbers, and license plate and service certificate numbers of their registered cabbies. It claimed the data were needed to help in the fight against unlicensed taxis.

Shanghai Qiangsheng Taxi Co, the city's largest cab firm, said that in the past two months it has received more than 300 complaints regarding the booking software. When dealing with them, it found on several occasions that the personal information of legitimate drivers had been usurped by illegal operators to register for the apps.

Didi Taxi told Shanghai Daily yesterday that it has already handed in the information as requested. Kuaidi Taxi was unavailable for comment.

"They have provided some information but it was incomplete," said Huang Xiaoyong, a spokesperson for the committee.

A lawyer said he thinks the traffic authority will need legal support if it wants to force the companies to release the data.

"The information is regarded as a company's property," said Liu Chunquan, a partner at Shanghai Panocean Law Firm.

"Firms are obliged to provide information about workers if it is required as part of an investigation into a crime, but I don't know of any law that says they have to help when there has been no crime," he said.