case-studies

Driverless — Case Studies Index

This directory contains case study documents for each module. Every case study follows the same structure:

1. What Happened at Uber — the specific problem, incident, or design failure
2. Impact — user trust, revenue, legal consequences
3. Root Cause — technical or organizational
4. Our Approach — how Driverless solves it differently
5. Why It Works — references to research, industry best practices
6. Trade-offs — what we sacrifice and why it's acceptable

---

Phase 1 — Core Platform & Identity

Module	Case Study	Status
User Management	Monolith scaling pain & the 2016 data breach	✅ Complete
Authentication	Account takeover attacks	⬜ Planned
Driver Onboarding	Background check failures & impersonation	⬜ Planned
Profile & Privacy	GDPR violations (€290M + €10M fines)	⬜ Planned

Phase 2 — Real-Time & Geospatial

Module	Case Study	Status
GPS Tracking	Write amplification at scale	⬜ Planned
Geospatial Indexing	O(n) nearest-driver to O(1) cell lookup	⬜ Planned
ETA Calculation	Straight-line distance inaccuracy	⬜ Planned
Routing	Unsafe route suggestions	⬜ Planned

Phase 3 — Matching & Dispatch

Module	Case Study	Status
Ride Lifecycle	Double-dispatch race conditions	⬜ Planned
Matching Algorithm	"Closest driver" failure modes	⬜ Planned
Batched Matching	Greedy vs global optimization	⬜ Planned
Supply Prediction	Reactive surge vs proactive repositioning	⬜ Planned

Phase 4 — Pricing & Payments

Module	Case Study	Status
Dynamic Pricing	Surge pricing opacity & Hurricane Sandy	⬜ Planned
Fare Estimation	Unpredictable final fares	⬜ Planned
Payments	Cash markets & payment fraud	⬜ Planned
Driver Earnings	Opaque commission & driver churn	⬜ Planned
Promotions	Mastermind rules engine & abuse rings	⬜ Planned

Phase 5 — Safety & Fraud

Module	Case Study	Status
In-Ride Safety	Reactive vs proactive safety engineering	⬜ Planned
Identity Verification	Driver impersonation incidents	⬜ Planned
Fraud Detection (RADAR)	Adversarial fraud & ML-powered detection	⬜ Planned
Ratings	Rating manipulation & accountability	⬜ Planned
Disputes	Manual resolution doesn't scale	⬜ Planned

Phase 6 — Scale & Compliance

Module	Case Study	Status
Notifications	Multi-channel delivery reliability	⬜ Planned
Compliance Engine	Legal battles across jurisdictions	⬜ Planned
Observability	Silent outages & "design for failure"	⬜ Planned