Didi, the operator of multiple ride-sharing services in China, has announced that it has suspended Hitch for the time being following the murder of a 20-year-old female passenger by a driver in the city of Wenzhou, China. The company has suspended operations of the ride-sharing service Hitch as it examines the policies and tries to figure out a way to ensure that this doesn’t happen again. Suspending the service became inevitable because this is the second such incident this year.
Earlier this year in May, a driver for the service raped and killed his 21-year-old passenger in the Henan province. He was using his father’s account at that time. Didi suspended its service for six weeks and made some changes to prevent this from happening again but unfortunately, the changes don’t seem to have done enough.
The steps that Didi took after the initial incident included late-night restrictions, new verification methods, and an emergency button. The suspect involved in this incident didn’t have a criminal record, had a valid license and vehicle identification documents, and even passed the new mandatory facial recognition test.
However, there had been complaints about him, including most recently from a female passenger who reported to the company that he asked her to sit in the front seat with him, drove her to an isolated location, and then tried to follow her.
Didi has responded to this incident by suspending the service again and also firing its general manager and the vice president for customer services. An investigation has been launched to ascertain what happened. The suspension is only limited to Hitch, though, as Didi’s other services continue to function.