• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, May 8, 2017

Ride-hailing company Uber has settled an investigation in Washington state by promising to take steps to obtain residents' consent before sending them text messages.

The settlement agreement, unveiled late last week, also requires Uber to include opt-out links in its text messages, and to pay $40,000 to the state Attorney General's office.

The deal "ensures that consumers control whether they receive messages from Uber," Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson stated.

Ferguson's office began receiving complaints about unsolicited text messages in 2014, according to a statement on its Web site. Some of the messages allegedly appeared to be intended for drivers, but were instead sent to people who had never signed up as drivers.

The attorney general's office added that a "glitch" in Uber's system resulted in some people receiving numerous text messages.

The investigation centered on whether Uber violated the federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act, which prohibits companies from using automated dialers to send SMS ads without the recipients' consent.

The company is still facing potential class-action lawsuits accusing it of sending unwanted text messages. One of the earliest text spam cases brought againt the company was filed in late 2014 by four individuals; three of them said they provided their cell phone numbers to the company as part of an application to work as drivers, while the fourth said she never gave Uber her cell phone number.