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A new study found that men who pose shirtless on dating apps give the impression that they engage in risky sexual behavior, and are viewed as less competent by potential dates.

According to the study, shirtless pictures are a turnoff for women, because they assume these men are having more casual sex, which poses increased risk for the women they date. Women also tended to objectify the men in these photos, and viewed them as less competent as a result.

According to PsyPost, researchers surveyed a relatively small sample - 567 undergraduate students in the U.S. between the ages of 18 and 25. Participants were shown one of eight mock Tinder profiles featuring an image of the same man, a white young male from the waist up, and asked their thoughts about attractiveness, social appeal, and competence. The profiles were manipulated to emphasize differences - a muscular body vs non-muscular, shirtless vs wearing a shirt, and the person advertising in his profile that he’s looking for a relationship vs. casual sex.   

Many dating app users have complained about getting unsolicited nude photos, and are now demanding digital consent before a communicating with a match.

Dating apps have been struggling with what to do about this issue for a while, but since the pandemic attracted many new users to dating apps, the problem has grown. According to The New York Post, A World Wide Web Foundation survey found that 52 percent of young women and girls said they had experienced online abuse, including threatening messages, sexual harassment and being sent lewd photos without consent. A whopping majority of 87 percent said they believe the issue is only getting worse. 

Dating app Bumble launched a feature called Private Detector to counteract this problem. Private Detector works with AI to detect when a nude photo is sent and blurs the picture before the recipient can see it, allowing them to block and report the user without having to see it first.

Dating app Bumble has been urging states to pass bills similar to the one it initiated in Texas, which makes it illegal for people to send unsolicited nude photos electronically. In mid-April, Virginia passed such a bill into law.

According to the new law, any adult sending an unsolicited “intimate image” electronically to another adult could be fined up to $500. The law defines intimate image as a “photo, film, video, recording, digital picture or other visual reproduction of a person 18 years of age or older who is in a state of undress so as to expose the human male or female genitals.”  

USA Today spoke with Bumble about how company's head of public policy for the Americas, Payton Iheme, reached out to Virginia Senator Jennifer McClellan for help with the legislation, since the company had success a few years ago passing a similar bill in Texas. The Virginia Senate had voted down another lewd photos bill two years before that carried criminal penalties, but since the new bill introduced civil penalties only, lawmakers felt more comfortable passing it into law.

As Russia bans more social media platforms, Ukrainians are turning to dating app Tinder to break through the country’s propaganda network.

The U.K.’s Express said that Ukrainians are using Tinder’s Passport feature to match with Russians, and then sharing images from the war over the app to counteract Putin’s propaganda campaign. Russians have been told via state TV that there is no war, and that Russia is “liberating” people in the Ukraine. Putin has banned the use of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram in an effort to control the narrative.

A Slovakian media agency noted the trend in Tinder and is making it easier for Ukrainians to participate by launching its “Special Love Operation” movement that encourages people to match with Russian singles and flood them with images from the war in Ukraine, so they know what is actually happening. 

Image: Tinder

Dating app Tinder is rolling out another interactive feature for its Explore section. According to the company’s blog post, Fast Chat: Blind Date will allow users to chat without being able to see each other’s photos, so they focus on personality instead of image. 

When users opt in to the Blind Date feature, they are asked to complete a series of questions, and are paired with others based on similar responses. The questions are meant to spark conversation in an ice-breaker style, like “I put ketchup on___.” The two daters then start a timed chat in which they receive the responses as prompts, so they can have a little fun with awkward first conversations. 

When the chat time ends, they can like the other person’s profile and if they both match they can see each other’s photos and continue talking or messaging, according to the company's blog. 

After receiving numerous complaints from their users, dating apps in South Korea are cracking down on users who mask up in their profiles in an attempt to hide their faces.

According to The Korean Herald, this practice has become known as “magikkun,” from the English word “mask” and the Korean word “sagikkun,” which means fraud. People who use masks in their profile photos are assumed to be deceiving potential matches, because they are hiding what they look like in real life. 

Some users are avoiding swiping right on masked-up profiles altogether, where others use video chat or request a selfie from the user before agreeing to meet them in person.