‘I’ll be AI’s worst nightmare’: Uber drivers’ fight runs through Switzerland

Uber drivers in Amsterdam, protesting against “fake self-employment”. AFP

Uber drivers across Europe are challenging the opaque algorithms that determine their pay and assign rides. Their battle has roots in Geneva.

Early in his time with Uber, Brahim Ben Ali, a former driver in his forties from the outskirts of Lille, began to feel something was amiss with the platform. “I saw people making more money than me, even though I was out on the road for eight or ten hours. I couldn’t understand why,” he says. Ben Ali, who drove for Uber from 2015 to 2019, sometimes spent 60 to 70 hours per week behind the wheel, making less than €6 (CHF5.65) an hour – well below France’s minimum wage.

Ben Ali says the app encouraged drivers to go to certain areas, attracted by higher prices and greater demand, which then disappeared by the time they arrived. Drivers who rejected too many rides, he claims, would receive fewer offers or be disconnected from the platform.

“They played with us as if we were Pokémon,” Ben Ali says.

Brahim is a former Uber driver from the outskirts of Lille. Courtesy of Brahim Ben Ali

Growing suspicious, Ben Ali asked the platform to hand over all the data it held about him, hoping to better understand how the app worked. Each time, he says, his requests were either denied or only partially met.

That marked the beginning of his fight against the US tech giant’s algorithms and practices. Together with his union, Ben Ali organised large protests across France in 2019. He was subsequently disconnected from the platform without an explanation – “the equivalent of being fired”, he says.

Ben Ali believed that the decision to disconnect him had not been made by a human resources team but by an algorithm. To prove it, he first turned to France’s data protection authority. Then, through a mutual acquaintance, he met Paul-Olivier Dehaye, a mathematician and founder of PersonalData.IO, a Geneva-based association that helps platform workers – including drivers and delivery workers – exercise their rights over their personal data.

The French union and the Swiss association banded together to get to the bottom of Uber’s practices.

>> Uber drivers in Switzerland talk about their working conditions:

Reconstructing the ‘Uber system’ from Geneva

Dehaye’s work began about a decade ago, when he realised that reconstructing Uber’s working conditions would require access to the data generated by drivers as they used the app.

“Everyone has the right to obtain the data that documents their working conditions,” Dehaye says. This right was strengthened in 2018, when the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) became applicable across the European Union. Drawing on GDPR, Dehaye began helping drivers across Europe get their data.

It wasn’t easy. Dehaye says that even finding out where to send a formal request was a challenge. And when Uber did respond, he says, their information was often incomplete. “There was always something missing,” he says. Dehaye persisted, pressing Uber for months. “I went all the way to the [European] headquarters in Amsterdam to force Uber to listen to us.”

Paul-Olivier Dehaye is a mathematician and founder of PersonalData.IO Olivier Vogelsang

Once they finally gained access to the data, Dehaye and the drivers began piecing together elements of the Uber system. They found that the platform collected large amounts of information, including how long a driver had been available, how long they had waited for a ride, where they were before accepting it, how many rides they rejected, when they began travelling towards a passenger and how long they transported them.

What emerges, says Dehaye, is a system of extensive algorithmic control of drivers’ work. Uber’s algorithms, he argues, do much more than simply connect drivers and passengers: they use AI and machine learning models to determine fares and play a role in deciding how rides are allocated, and automated systems can also be involved in decisions to disconnect drivers.

“Another part of the system remains completely opaque, and that is precisely where algorithmic manipulation can take place,” Dehaye says.

Algorithmic manipulation

One of the most controversial issues concerns the share of each fare retained by Uber. Dehaye argues that Uber sometimes takes more than the 25%External link it declares, with “variations from trip to trip”. The result, he says, is “a race to the bottom in drivers’ working conditions and pay,” aimed at increasing the number of drivers available on the platform and therefore the supply of rides for passengers.

Uber disputes this characterisation. It says the difference between what riders pay and what drivers receive may include taxes, insurance and other third-party costs. The company states that its cut of the fares has remained relatively stable with a global share of 21% External linkin the third quarter of 2025. It does not specify a range for how much its share can vary from trip to trip.

Uber driver Cem Kurun, who works in canton Zurich, is speaking out about his deteriorating working conditions. Luca Zanetti

Several drivers, however, have complained about what they see as manipulation and a lack of transparency in pricing. Ben Ali says the difference between what a passenger paid and what he received was as much as 60% on some rides. Whenever he asked for an explanation, he says, he was told there had been a “calibration problem”.

In Zurich, Uber driver Cem Kurun told Swissinfo that on one occasion he compared what he had earned from a ride with what the passenger said they had paid and found a difference of almost 50%. He also recounts the case of a colleague who allegedly received just over CHF30 for a ride for which the passenger said they had paid CHF80.

Like Ben Ali, Kurun suspects that drivers’ behaviour may affect the allocation of rides and that drivers who reject many offers may be penalised.

“Often when I’m waiting in the same place as other drivers, I notice that they keep getting rides while I’m left there waiting,” he says. On the day Swissinfo spoke to him, Kurun said he had been working for around nine hours, since 8am, and had earned just CHF70.

Uber categorically rejects these allegations. The company describes as “completely false” claims that it adjusts the prices or rides offered to drivers based on individual behaviour, such as previous decisions to reject a ride.

According to Uber, drivers receive a weekly earnings statement showing exactly how much passengers paid for the trips they completed and how much Uber retained. Kurun confirms receiving these statements but says that in some cases the amount shown did not correspond to what passengers told him they had paid. Ben Ali also says the statements did not always allow him to verify the total amount actually paid by passengers or fully understand how much Uber retained or deducted costs.

Uber hit with million-euro fines

By joining forces with activist drivers such as Ben Ali in France, Dehaye and his association have contributed to several legal actions against Uber.

In 2023, Uber was fined €10 million for a series of breaches of its transparency obligations and of drivers’ rights regarding their data. The following year, it received a €290 million fine for transferring European drivers’ personal data to the US.

And this summer, the Dutch Data Protection Authority imposed a fine of almost €825 million on Uber for temporarily suspending or permanently deactivating drivers’ accounts through fully automated decision-making processes, in violation of GDPR rules. 

These results are spurring further action across Europe. 

With early help from Dehaye and his Geneva-based organisation, British former driver James Farrar became involved in the fight to gain access to drivers’ data. Worker Info Exchange International, the organisation Farrar leads, recently launched a new collective action in the Netherlands, where Uber has its European headquarters, on behalf of around 240,000 drivers across Europe.

Uber and taxi drivers gathered in Albisguetli, Zurich, for a strike action against working conditions and pay at Uber, October 2025. Keystone / Michael Buholzer

Worker Info Exchange estimates that changes to Uber’s pay system have reduced drivers’ annual income by about £5,000 (CHF5,850). Uber rejects these allegations, saying trip fares are solely based on real-time information about the journey, including its duration, pick-up point and destination.

Ben Ali believes the losses suffered by drivers go much further after years of what he calls poor working conditions. Together with Dehaye and around 19,000 drivers, he is now working on a separate collective action. According to his calculations, claims could amount to around €40,000 per driver.

“Why should Uber be the one getting rich off our backs thanks to our data?” Ben Ali asks. “We need to take back control of our data.”

“I’ll be AI’s worst nightmare,” he says. He promises to keep fighting.

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Edited by Gabe Bullard/vdv/dos