Decentralized Ride Hailing System using Blockchain and IPFS

Ride-hailing applications like Uber and Ola have gained immense popularity in India and across the globe as convenient alternatives to traditional modes of travel such as private vehicles which can be unaffordable many times due to rising fuel prices and maintenance cost etc., buses and trains which are crowded; and taxis and auto rickshaws which can deny you service at the driver's whim. The advancement in internet technology and affordable smartphones have made it convenient to book a ride through our smartphones in just a few clicks. However, the service has also brought with it a slew of other challenges like unpredictable surge-pricing and high intermediary fees. The current research into decentralized systems for vehicles is accelerating rapidly. Even then, implementing a decentralized ride-hailing platform proves to be a difficult challenge due to the inherently centralized nature of traditional ride-hailing systems. Blockchain and other similar decentralized technologies are an attractive choice for this architecture due to their immutability, transparency and fault tolerance. If implemented successfully, decentralization using blockchain technology would remove roadblocks along the way such as intermediary fees and surge charges by third parties as it would offer more transparency. This paper proposes a framework for developing a decentralized ride-hailing architecture implemented on the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) and Ethereum blockchain platform.