Tinder?was founded in 2012 and was first used at?universities. In 2013 it won the Best Startup TechCrunch award and it has since gone viral. Tinder is a location based dating service (they call it “social discovery”) that connects people with similar interests and nearby locations. It uses Facebook profiles to match people. Users of Tinder can ‘like’ or ‘fit’ recommended?people with a swipe (movement of the finger). Tinder has more than 10 million (daily) active users and is available in 24 languages. The app allows users to see if the?match has been using the service revently. But in February 2014 the service was discredited when security researchers found a weak spot and the locations of users could be exposed to precision.
Dr Mark McGuire, professor of digital media at the University of Otago, explains?that risks are involved for social media dating apps, such as identity theft, online fraud and physical dangers too?such as kidnapping, assault or sexual abuse. He considers these dangers many times greater than for?approaching someone in the physical world. “These online ‘predators’?are not going to sit and wait until you approach them. They pick?their victims and make contact.”, he says. Identity fraud is very common. Moreover, it is very annoying if?there is also money to earned by the service provider when this happens. Tinder earns money for?gathering personal information such as location data and personal preferences. Tinder also shares your friends network with others. In this way, even your friends have become a vulnerability without them knowing about it. However, there are users who get back at creepy Tinder dudes, as shows the story of a?23 year old artist who confronted her dates online with nude sketches that she made of them. Her Instagram account was closed because of the sketches, because there were too many complaints about her account. Even tips are being exchanged on how to check whether a Tinderdate not a ‘sex offender’ is.
Grindr, a similar app but for gay (or bi) men sells customer information to companies who in this way can offer their highly targeted ads. Grindr has been around since 2009 and says it has more than five million active users. There is a police case?from Cambridgeshire of a burglary that was linked to Grindr.
eHarmony?has?also?been mentioned?by the police for their?dangers, because location information is shared. The newer service Wyldfire?says it launched a different approach for this reason.?They day they have built in a screening process and therefore provide a safer dating service for women and offer no access to?weirdos.
Sometimes a first Tinder dat is so bad, it’s hilarious. And that?was the idea for the well?known episode of “Local Attraction ‘:
This episode was such a huge success that a Kickstarter crowdfuncing project?started to make a series out of it. Below episode 2 of Local Attraction:
Sources: Wikipedia, Dailydot (1, 2)