You can run GPS w/out a cell signal. GPS is not tracking you. Also, it's more of just a question of premise. I've taken a lot of cabs and never had this issue and it's hard to imagine them thinking they will get away with driving shenanigans in the modern era. Has this happened to you or just an old boomer tale?
Taxis literally refused to take us after arriving in Budapest because we speak Hungarian and one of us studied there so had the Budapest accent too and everyone of them was all of a sudden busy and waiting for someone (they were literally just standing around smoking)
The original commenter was complaining about privacy issues with ridesharing apps, so I am not sure what cell signal has to do with anything?
Having gps on is literally useless unless you check your google maps or waze or something that you are not taken on a ride around and all of those track you so have the same privacy issues as alluded to by the original commenter I don't think I can make my point any clearer.
Also if you think this doesn't happen in less developed countries then you are extremely naive.
And you think that's not possible with rideshare? All they have to do is drive through a "checkpoint" and split whatever they get from you. To Uber the driver was a victim too.
You can't imagine famous people, federal investigators, Union organisers, protected witnesses, or literally anybody else that wouldn't want their movements trackable by a company or anybody that company gets hacked by?
I understand privacy and stuff, but sometimes people take it and "muh freedoms" way too seriously overboard.
I never said there might not be legitimate reasons to avoid tracking. I'm saying sometimes it's taken too seriously to the point of silliness and forgoing convenience for the sake of "I don't want the gub'ment tracking me" freedom nonsense. There will be times when it makes sense, there will be times when it's just silly.
That's not how privacy works though. You either have it when you don't need it or don't have it when you need it. You don't just get it when you need it.
It's not silliness to presume that you could eventually be in some situation where you need a high amount of privacy.
Maybe if you don't actually participate in society, there's some life circumstances that mean you would never need privacy. There's probably like a hundred people alive like that. I don't think they take taxis.
I have never come up with a specific number but one of the few services I consider worth selling my info for is education. I've used Duolingo a lot as well as some other educational apps knowing precisely how many (it's a lot) trackers are reporting on me