Ride-hailing service Uber has just been dealt another significant setback by being denied a renewal of its operating license in the city of York in the UK.
The company does not appear to be having a good time in Yorkshire, as only a few days ago it was denied a renewal in the much larger city of Sheffield. The local authorities in York have cited the recent major data breach as well as a large number of local complaints as their chief concerns for not awarding a renewed operating license to the company.
The data breach affected over 57 million users and drivers of the service worldwide and Uber has confirmed that it affected 2.7 million UK users, this represents the vast majority of the users of the service in the country. The scale of the data breach alone was bad enough, but the fact that Uber tried to pay off the hackers and cover up the whole saga made it far worse. However, even before the full scale of that data breach was known, Uber had already been denied its renewal in the UK"s capital, London.
The company has 21 days to invoke the appeals process against the decision in York. Once initiated in court, Uber can continue operating until a decision is made. Uber is currently engaged in that same appeals process in London with although the case may not be formally heard until as late as June 2018.
For another UK city to reject the renewal of an operating license means that there"s potential that the same might happen for subsequent applications with other local authorities. Ultimately, this could mean that Uber could face a UK-wide problem. The appeals against all of these cases will probably drag on for some time, however, the decision reached in London may well influence the outcomes reached in the other UK cities, potentially sealing the fate of the ride-hailing service in the country.
Source: Business Insider |Image via The Drum
