PHOENIX -- The backup Uber driver involved in the first self-driving vehicle fatality has been charged with negligent homicide for being distracted in the moments before fatally striking a woman in suburban Phoenix.

Uber is set to acquire the food-delivery startup Postmates in a $2.6 billion deal, The New York Times and Bloomberg reported Sunday.People familiar with the matter told Bloomberg and The Times that the all-stock deal could be announced as soon as Monday. According to The Times, Uber is expected to merge Postmates with its popular homegrown food-delivery app Uber Eats.

Uber on Thursday said it would let drivers across the state of California set their own rates as a function of the company’s price “multiplier” — used in Uber’s so-called “surge” pricing. The move builds on a pricing experiment that began in January in Sacramento, Santa Barbara and Palm Springs. Previously, drivers had no ability to set their own rates, which was one of the primary critiques of proponents of AB5, the state law that took effect at the beginning of the year.

Uber has been quietly helping health officials around the world with contact tracing, the company told Reuters. The ride-sharing company has built a special portal for health officials to request access to rider and driver data. Uber has provided user data to officials before, for example with police departments investigating a crime.

A court ruling expected as soon as Wednesday could determine whether Uber and Lyft shut down across California later this week. The companies are threatening that they will be forced to shut down after a court in San Francisco last week ruled that drivers for their apps are employees, not independent contractors, under state law. The decision gave them 10 days to make their drivers employees. But the companies must retool their apps to support the employment model, corporate officials said, and cannot meet that deadline.

Like other ridesharing companies, it made a big bet on an automated future that has failed to materialise, says Aaron Benanav, a researcher at Humboldt University

190 Uber employees have filed a lawsuit against the ride-hailing giant accusing it of indirectly raising their tax bills when it accelerated the issue date of their stock options ahead of its lackluster IPO last year.

Uber briefly charged its users in downtown Sydney a minimum $100 to escape an armed hostage crisis, a result of automatic surge pricing meant to get more drivers online. An executive in the city's Central Business District (CBD) sent Mashable screenshots of the Uber app that showed the company was charging up to four-times the normal rate because "demand is off the charts."...

Last month, as Uber weathered a fresh storm of criticism about its attitude to critics and user privacy — following revelations that a senior Uber exec had floated the idea of spending money to dig up dirt on critical journalists’ private lives — Senator Al Franken posted a public letter to Uber CEO Travis Kalanick, raising concerns about the company’s apparently systematic disregard for privacy and asking that it clarify its privacy policies.

Of the many attractions offered by my hometown, a west coast peninsula famed for its deep natural harbor, perhaps the most striking is that you never have to leave the house. With nothing more technologically advanced than a phone, you can arrange to have delivered to your doorstep, often in less than an hour, takeaway food, your weekly groceries, alcohol, cigarettes, drugs (over-the-counter, prescription, proscribed), books, newspapers...

Everyone's favorite rideshare app has decided that Christmas Eve is the perfect time to slip through a small change to its Uber Taxi service. Nothing big. Just a $2 fee every single time you want to hail a cab through Uber. Motherboard has a copy of the email that Uber (very quietly) sent to UberT users, on this, a day when everyone will totally be paying attention to their emails. UberT currently works as a hailing system for yellow or boro cabs — use the app to get a ride...

Uber has called it quits in Spain, at least for now. Uber, the ride-booking company that has been plagued by vocal opposition from taxi associations and policy makers around the world, suspended its operations in Spain late Tuesday. The decision came in response to a judge’s ruling this month that the company’s low-cost service, called UberPop, did not comply with Spanish laws and potentially amounted to unfair competition for taxi drivers.

I always thought it would be fun to drive a cab. I always talk up the person driving when I take a cab or Uber. How long have they been doing it? Do they own the car or does the company? What do they think they will make tonight? About a month ago I decided I wanted to drive for Uber on New Years Eve. It seemed like an opportunity to earn a good chunk of money and experience what it was like.

I am Uber. I can see my thousands of cars. I don’t know if I am an extension of them or they are an extension of me.

Tonight we might get a glimpse of the kinder, gentler Uber, but we won’t be able to talk about it. The startup has endured months of disastrous press coverage, including Uber exec Emil Michael saying the company should smear journalists that criticize it. Now the company has emailed reporters saying “The Uber Communications Team invites you to join us for drinks” at a San Francisco bar tonight.

Ever wonder how and why Uber drivers get banned? If it’s not for criminal behavior, the waters get murky. What do Uber and Harvard have in common? Both only use the top 10 percent or so of their rating scales. For a Harvard student, the median grade is an A- and for an Uber driver, anything below a 4.7 out of 5 average rating from passengers spells trouble. Or, as one driver memorably puts it on Uber People, a popular...

Uber has been the subject of controversy all around the globe. An Indian woman who says she was raped by an Uber driver while she was traveling in his cab in December is suing the San Francisco–based online firm in a U.S. federal court in California, claiming it failed to put in place basic safety procedures while running its car service in India.

“It’s a genius way to start a business nowadays, especially because nobody’s doing it.” The man sitting beside me is sharing the most insightful business advice I’ve heard lately. His ideas are as unconventional as the location of our conversation. We’re not in a coffee shop or a corner office. We’re in an Uber and he’s my driver.

Uber waited more than five months to notify 50,000 drivers whose names and drivers-license numbers were taken in a computer-security breach last year, much longer than allowed by many state laws.

Uber's "low-cost" UberPop service has been banned in Germany after a court decided it contravened transport laws. Judges imposed fines of €250,000 (£181,000) for each violation of the order. It followed the news that the company's Paris offices were raided by police investigating the same service. And, in South Korea, nearly 30 people linked to the company, including chief executive Travis Kalanick, were charged with running an illegal taxi firm.