Design And Implementation Of Facial Recognition And Emergency Call Api In Ride-Sharing Application

There are so many literatures related to ride-sharing systems and ride-sharing security. This chapter gives a summary of some of these literatures.

Ride-sharing systems

Ride-sharing is an economical way in which both passengers and drivers get mutually benefited. It reduces the number of vehicles on road, thereby reducing traffic congestion and emission of harmful gases by the vehicles. It also increases vehicle occupancy and reduces parking requirement. The growing use and popularity of smartphones and GPS-enabled devices provides the tools required to implement real time or dynamic ride-sharing. Ride-sharing systems rely on accurate information being delivered in a time-sensitive manner. It interfaces with the ride-share devices through a communication broadcast station. It also arranges and administers a rideshare transaction between a driver and a passenger, that is, it accepts passengers’ real-time ride requests sent from smart phones and schedules vehicles to pick them up with time, capacity, and monetary constraints. The monetary constraints guarantee that passengers pay less and drivers earn more.

Ride-sharing security measures

Privacy and safety concerns are the main obstacles faced when encouraging people to use ride-sharing services. Although ride-sharing service has facilitated public usage of commute, the safety of drivers and passengers is a major concern. There is a need to introduce small and big measures to ensure that ride-sharing participants (passenger and driver) stay safe during a ride. Some ride-sharing platforms like Uber, have taken the following measures to ensure the security of passengers during a ride.

• Taking regulatory actions against drivers or passengers who act inappropriately such as drunk driving or driving unsafely, abusive behavior or language use with either the driver or rider, unwanted contact with the passenger after the trip has ended and so on.
• Providing GPS tracking so passengers can share their journey with family and friends in real time.
• Providing a rating system that gives passengers the ability to rate drivers at the end of trips.

In the paper titled “Passengers Safety in Ride-Sharing Services”, the authors gave different suggestions that can enhance the security of ride-share participants (drivers and passengers). These include:

• The introduction of mandatory dash cams in the rides through which the rider can put a live transmission of his/her ride on social media or YouTube, in order to have more eyes.
• The introduction of watchdog network that can monitor rides by keeping an eye on the transmission and can contact lawmakers in case of emergency.
• A distress alarm on the app which can report discomfort or suspicious behavior of the ride-share participants.
• Keeping the vehicle’s indoor lights on during late hours
• Display of ride sharing company’s sticker on front and rear of the car
• Introduction of passenger insurance add-on in the ride type.

Security enhanced ride-sharing systems

A number of academic researches provide insight into ride-sharing systems and the approach taken by different researchers to develop a security enhanced ride-sharing system:

A negotiation-based model called “Match Maker” was presented by Goel et al(2016). This model hides the exact location information data for system participants (drivers and passengers) while implementing privacy preserving ride sharing. The concept of imprecision (not being precise about location of the user out of set of n locations) and obfuscation was used, which equates a higher degree of imprecision with a higher degree of privacy.

Haddad et al (2013) designed and implemented a new approach in developing a mobile ride-sharing and carpooling application. Using an algorithm, the system can find a combined route between driver and several passengers. It automatically computes the best overlapped route that can be found. Both driver’s and passenger’s locations are shown in real time on the map, hence they can see each other on their smartphone screen. The system aims to ensure users’ safety and easier recognition, especially considering the openness of the application and the unidentified users behind the usernames. The system incorporates user- friendly features along with ensuring security and privacy. Every user needs a registration code in order to activate the application. This registration code can be obtained in one of several ways:

1. From a friend who is already a registered member and has accumulated a certain amount of credits, which allow him to generate registration codes to distribute to others.
2. By belonging to communities that have been approved by the system’s operators for the purposes of distributing registration codes (student groups, companies, etc.).

Huang et al. (2012) provided a method and system for a comprehensive security-enhanced ride-share system. The ride-share system monitors the ride-share transaction while in progress and determines the security of the ride-share participants. Information obtained from the ride-share participant device is analyzed for anomalies that might indicate a security concern. For example, the location of the participant device during the ride-share transaction can be compared to a trip route and a security alert triggered if that location deviates from the expected trip route by more than a predetermined threshold. The rideshare security system may also respond to asynchronous notifications initiated by a participant device, for example, an emergency button.