It’s never been more obvious that the online world is full of dangers. Dating apps are an easy and popular way to find a romantic or sexual partner. There’s a very big gap between those two statements, and Dating’s Dangerous Secrets, hosted by journalist Linda Adey, sets out to explore it.
The statistics are staggering. Worldwide, Tinder has been downloaded 430 million times, and created 65 billion matches. In the UK alone, five million people have a Tinder profile. And not all the results are bad. A survey set up by Dating’s Dangerous Secrets shows that out of people who’ve used a dating app in the past four years, around three quarters have had a positive or neutral experience.
It’s the remaining one in four people that this special focuses on. By investigating exactly what happens when a report of inappropriate behaviour is made to the apps that are so central to people’s dating experiences, it quickly becomes clear that for a lot of offenders there’s simply no reason to change their dubious, hurtful and often criminal behaviour.
But what if there was? Dating’s Dangerous Secrets outlines a simple and obvious solution: link people’s dating app profiles to their real-life identities. If there was a record of who they are and what they’ve been doing that potential matches could access, then any claims against them – or criminal charges – would be obvious. But as it soon becomes clear, that kind of background check goes against the dating apps’ business model. And online, business remains king.
‘Dating’s Dangerous Secrets’ looks at the experience of users of well-known dating apps. Source: BBC
Twenty-six-year-old Bex was fresh out of a break-up when she set up her Tinder profile. A few days after that, she matched with a 27-year-old guy, and after a week of chat they met up. In the bedroom, everything was fine to begin with – until he started to hurt her, and he refused to stop no matter what she said. Eventually he left; she felt she’d been sexually assaulted, but thanks to a bad prior experience with the law (she’d made a complaint about a previous sexual assault to the police, who did nothing), she didn’t report it.
What she did try to do was report the man to Tinder. Tinder claim to treat reports of sexual assault “with the utmost urgency and seriousness” and that it will “take appropriate action”. In Bex’s case, that action turned out to be banning her from the app, claiming she’d violated the terms and conditions (without actually telling her what she’d done wrong). It took her nine months to get a reply from Tinder, and when she did, it was basically an automated reply.
The problem with what comes next is that all too often the apps aren’t all that interested in restricting or removing the profiles of people who’ve been behaving badly. It’s not hard to see why: the more people they have to offer, the more enticing their app looks to new members. But what works commercially for an app doesn’t necessarily work out for their users.
Linda Adey talks to Bex about her experience. Source: BBC
Other cases looked at in Dating’s Dangerous Secrets are even more grim. One woman was raped twice by her Tinder date; when she went to report him to the app, she found out he’d already blocked her, which erased any record of their contact and made it impossible for her to access his profile to report or block him. Another woman using app Plenty of Fish was murdered by her date, who turned out to be a repeat violent offender – not the kind of person who should even be allowed onto a dating app.
Convicted sex offenders are officially banned from using dating apps by each company’s terms and conditions. But with no background checks, there’s nothing stopping them from using the apps. So how can apps protect women’s safety in a potentially dangerous online environment?
Reporting someone often leads nowhere. Source: BBC
According to some of the people interviewed here, short of having a bodyguard go round to supervise the dates, they can’t. The apps can be taken to court for negligence, but that requires proving that the app knew they were letting potential (or convicted) offenders use their service. Which is the kind of thing the apps go out of their way to claim they can’t know.
Legally, dating apps are not responsible for what happens after you match with someone on their platform. The question then is, do they have a duty to give users as much information as possible about a potential partner before they match with them? Dating’s Dangerous Secrets presents a convincing case that they do – and a grim acknowledgement that without more pressure, the apps have no reason to change.
Dating’s Dangerous Secrets is available at SBS On Demand.
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