Reports indicate that Uber has filed a patent that would require the ride-hailing service to use Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) data in order to link riders of UberPool with others of similar interests. It is understood that this is meant to make UberPool rides less awkward as riders would be familiar with each other and would therefore not lack something to talk about.

From the information gleaned from the patent, riders of Uber would get an alert informing them that a fellow passenger was a friend of a friend on Facebook, grew up in the same area or attended the same school. Other common interests or backgrounds that could be shared include birthplace, country of origin or career.

Addressing ‘semi-social’ environment challenges

According to the patent application, the problem the technology is intended to solve is providing an ‘ice-breaker’ in semi-social conditions where the situation is not conducive for firing off questions to a stranger in a bid to find out areas of common interest. Many customers of LyftLine and UberPool currently have to ride in awkward silence unaware that they could both have a meaningful connection.

With the technology, riders would also have the power of choosing only to ride with passengers with whom they have something in common, a feature which could make UberPool more enticing to a lot of riders.

According to Uber, the revolution in urban transport is still in the early stages.

“The kind of impact [Uber] is going to have on our cities — 95 or 98% of it is still yet to happen,” the chief executive officer of Uber, Travis Kalanick wrote in The Upstarts, a newly published book.

Transport revolution has only begun

According to Kalanick, one of the ways Uber could help in further revolutionizing transport is reducing transport congestion. This would require ride-sharing as this ensures more efficient use of roads as it would reduce the number of vehicles moving about. Uber’s latest patent requiring the use of Facebook data helps in that regard as it makes UberPool more attractive.

In Thursday’s trading session, shares of Facebook fell by 1.79 percent to close the day at $130.84.