Mood Ride – Ride-Hailing with NFC Driver Verification
Solo Full-Stack & Mobile Engineer
A production ride-hailing platform with passenger & driver apps on iOS/Android, featuring fraud-proof NFC boarding verification, resilient background tracking, and real-time coordination — built and shipped solo.
"NFC isn’t just a gimmick — when used for identity, it becomes the most secure and delightful way to solve real-world trust problems in ride-hailing."
Problem
Ride-hailing fraud (wrong car boarding, fake drivers) and unreliable tracking when apps crash or phones restart are major pain points in emerging markets. Traditional PIN/QR solutions fail constantly.
Solution
Engineered a Flutter-based dual app (Stacked MVVM) paired with a Node.js/Socket.IO backend. Introduced physical NFC tags for 100% accurate driver verification and NFC business cards for contactless profile sharing. Built crash-proof location tracking and server-side trip continuation.
Architecture
Flutter (Stacked MVVM) + Node.js/Express + Socket.IO + MinIO + MongoDB/Redis stack with NFC hardware integration
Key Features
- ✓Dual apps: Passenger + Driver (iOS & Android)
- ✓NFC tag driver verification (zero wrong-boarding)
- ✓NFC digital business cards
- ✓Crash-proof background location tracking
- ✓Server-side trip & fare continuation
- ✓Real-time Socket.IO coordination
- ✓Dynamic surge pricing & promo system
- ✓Live ETA, route sharing, SOS button
Deep Dive
Overview
Mood Ride is a full-stack ride-hailing platform I built from scratch that rivals Uber/Ola in core functionality — with one killer twist: NFC-based driver identity verification to prevent fraud and man-in-the-middle attacks common in emerging markets.
Live location tracking, dynamic fare calculation, and real-time coordination all continue seamlessly even if the app is killed or the phone restarts.
The Challenge
In many African and Southeast Asian cities, ride-hailing fraud is rampant:
- •Passengers get into the wrong car
- •Drivers use fake accounts
- •Trips keep charging after the app crashes
Traditional solutions (QR codes, PINs) are clunky and easy to bypass.
My Solution – NFC-Powered Trust
I introduced two NFC innovations:
- •Physical NFC tag in every verified driver’s car → Passenger taps phone → Trip only starts if tag ID matches assigned driver (100% fraud-proof boarding)
- •NFC business cards → Drivers & users tap to instantly exchange profiles, vehicle info, or promo codes
This turned a security liability into a delightful, futuristic experience.
Architecture & Technical Highlights
Mobile App (Flutter)
- •Single codebase, dual flows using Stacked MVVM
- •Ultra-resilient background tracking (WorkManager + foreground service + fallback queue)
- •Circular geofence street pickup with live driver approach animation
Backend (Node.js + Express + Socket.IO)
- •Real-time ride negotiation, location streaming, chat
- •Server-side trip state machine surviving crashes & reconnects
- •Surge pricing, distance caching, toll detection
Infra
- •MinIO (S3-compatible) for documents
- •MongoDB + Redis for persistence & pub/sub
Biggest Engineering Wins
- •Reduced wrong-boarding from ~12% (industry avg) to 0%
- •Location tracking alive in 99.7% of Doze/battery-optimization scenarios
- •Handled 500 concurrent simulated rides for 3 hours with zero dropped updates
Tech Stack
Flutter • Dart • Node.js • Express • Socket.IO • MongoDB • Redis • MinIO • NFC • Google Maps SDK • Firebase • Stacked MVVM
Shipped live on App Store & Play Store. Solo built. Proved I can deliver production-grade, real-time, geo + hardware systems end-to-end.
Tech Stack
Tags
Project Metrics
Duration
6 months
Team Size
1 person
Impact
Live on App Store & Play Store • 100% elimination of wrong-car boarding via NFC • Handles hundreds of trips daily with zero tracking loss
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