Strava deletes 2.3 million rides to fight cheating

Strava has removed 2.3 million rides that were likely done on an e-bike but were uploaded as regular cycling activities. In addition, 1.6 million activities that were probably completed in a car or other vehicle also disappeared.

For many dedicated riders, segments, KOMs, and QOMs are a real motivation. Their credibility has been under pressure for years due to 'cheating.' With this cleanup, Strava shows that it takes the criticism seriously.

Artificial intelligence
The recent action is made possible by "enhanced e-bike detection." This is a system that uses artificial intelligence to analyze Strava activities.

The system is trained to recognize rides done on an e-bike but uploaded as a normal cycling activity. Strava reports that removing incorrect activities has restored the top-10 leaderboard positions for 293,000 users.

This is not the first time Strava has taken action. In May last year, 4.45 million activities were also deleted. The rules have long been clear: public activities that count towards leaderboards must not be done with an e-bike. Although the technology is becoming increasingly smarter, Strava encourages users to report activities that seem suspicious.