Dating apps in 2021: technically safer but threats still loom

Meeting the love of your life at a party seems like a thing of the past with online dating experiencing a major boom—not in the least thanks to the pandemic. Tinder reached a record three billion swipes in a single day in March 2020, while OkCupid experienced a massive 700-percent increase in dates from March to May that same year. Amid this growing popularity, Kaspersky decided to replicate its research from 2017 into the dating app landscape to see what’s improved and what hasn’t in terms of their security.

For their research, Kaspersky analyzed nine popular and highly rated dating apps with global user bases: Tinder, Bumble, OkCupid, Mamba, Pure, Feeld, Her, Happn, and Badoo.

What they found was that, when compared to 2017, while dating apps have become safer from a technical standpoint, major privacy risks remain.

In 2017, four of the apps studied made it possible to intercept data sent from the app, and many used the unencrypted HTTP protocol. However, in 2021, the situation has significantly improved. None of the apps studied use HTTP, and no data is sent if the protocol is not secure.

That said, significant privacy concerns remain with dating apps.

Networking sites

Most dating apps allow users to register their account with one of their social networking sites (Instagram, Facebook, Spotify, etc.). If the user chooses to do this, then their profile is automatically populated with information from that social networking site, such as photos and profile information.

Users are also invited to share information such as their place of work or university.

All of the aforementioned data makes it easy to find dating app users’ social media accounts, and depending on their privacy settings on those accounts, a host of other personal information.

In addition, apps like Happn, Her, Bumble and Tinder make it obligatory for users to share their location.

Some apps, like Mamba, share the distance of users to the nearest meter. Happn has an additional functionality that lets users see how many times and in what locations their matches have crossed paths with them.

Access to data such as users’ location, place of work, name, contact information, etc., leaves them vulnerable to cyberstalking or even physical stalking, as well as doxing (whereby previously private information is made public in order to shame or harm the victim).

Paid versions

What’s more, Mamba is the only application that lets users blur their photos for free, and Pure is the only one that prohibits users from taking screenshots of chats. This makes it possible for users to have their chats and photos shared without their permission, potentially for blackmail purposes or doxing.

However, many apps have been adding paid versions, and these include additional choices—often choices that can enhance users’ security.

For example, in the paid versions of Tinder and Bumble, you can manually choose your location to a specific region. Since only a region is available rather than a specific distance, it’s much harder to determine a user’s exact location. And some paid versions of apps, like Happn, offer users an “incognito mode,” whereby users can hide their profile from those they haven’t swiped right on and strangers.

“It’s always challenging to find a balance between building a digital presence and maintaining your privacy online, and the shift to online dating creates yet another area where users have to determine the best way for them to forge connections while protecting their security. Thankfully, what we’ve seen over the past few years is that dating apps are moving in the right direction, letting users connect more safely,” said Tatyana Shishkova, security expert at Kaspersky.

When it comes to the future of dating apps, Kaspersky has several predictions—and hopes—particularly when it comes to their security, such as the use of artificial intelligence to protect users from fraud and the creation of verified accounts. You can discover these and more predictions about the future of dating and love, as well as submit your own through the Earth 2050 project.

You can also learn more about the security of dating apps on Securelist.