Profiles

Tinder has partnered with the Centre for Social Research (CSR) to create a new safety guide for app users in India.

The safety guide, along with 15 safety features that are accessible on the Tinder app, are part of Tinder’s efforts to improve safety for users. The new guide “leverages CSR India’s insights amid the intersection of technology and violence against women,” according to Tinder’s announcement.

Starting in September, Tinder users will get a prompt through the app’s messaging system on how to access the safety guide, according to the Hindustan Times.

Tinder announced its new exclusive VIP service Tinder Select, which will cost members almost $500 per month (which works out to $6,000 per year!).

The new service will give top-tier members access to new features like a “VIP search, matching and conversation,” according to Bloomberg, none of which are currently available in Tinder’s existing paid subscription plans. Tinder did not reveal any details about the features.

The new service might have some similarities to exclusive dating app The League, which Tinder’s parent company Match Group acquired last year. There’s a market for exclusivity on dating apps, and the company is betting that offering a premium service will work for Tinder, too.

Tinder has been testing the VIP service, but now it’s an official subscription tier, at least for those invited to join. The new service was only offered to less than 1 percent of the most active Tinder users, according to Bloomberg News.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has brought a lawsuit against dating app eHarmony, alleging the company misled consumers through false advertising. It also alleges that the company deceived its customers about pricing and renewing their subscriptions.

According to The Guardian, the lawsuit filed in Australian federal court alleges the company of “entrapping singles” by showing them only blurred photos of their matches and not allowing them to send messages without paying for a subscription. The lawsuit also accuses the company of luring customers to sign up by falsely advertising “free dating” on the platform, as well as short-term membership offers and early cancellation opportunities.

In reality, users opting for the “free service” completed an 80-question profile survey before they had access to look at potential matches. However, when users completed the questions, they were served blurry profile photos of other members, and were only able to send one message as a reply to a premium member. If they wanted to continue messaging, they were required to pay for the service.

Image: Tinder

Tinder is reaching out to the coveted Gen Z market by partnering with Saweetie to welcome eighteen-year-olds to college, and to encourage them to meet people using the app.

Swipe Off is the nationwide challenge the dating app has launched, where it will award the college or university with the most swipe activity with a free concert headlined by the popular rapper, along with a surprise special guest.

The Swipe Off challenge is only open to select campuses participating in Tinder U, which is a feature college students can select that lets them connect with others at their school. According to the company’s announcement on the blog, the school that accumulates the most likes (or nopes) on Tinder by October 6th will win the free concert with Saweetie.

Men using filters to enhance their dating app photos tend to attract more matches, but they also come across as less trustworthy to women.

According to a new study published in Computers in Human Behavior, women were shown 10 profile photos of single men, both filtered and unfiltered versions. Most women preferred the more attractive, filtered versions of the men, but these same women also said they didn’t seem as trustworthy as the men in the untouched ones.

Researchers also found that ultimately while the women found altered profiles less trustworthy, they were in fact more interested in dating the men behind them. According to PsyPost.org, this conclusion “ultimately suggests that the allure of heightened physical attractiveness outweighs the reservations arising from diminished trustworthiness.”

Muzz dating app, formerly MuzzMatch, has had a hard time growing an active userbase in India, despite the country having the third largest Muslim population in the world. Also, nearly 50% of India’s population is under 25 years, making the country the second-largest market for dating apps (after the United States).

Muzz is marketed as a matchmaking app rather than a dating app for Muslim singles, because as founder Shahzad Younas told Rest of World: ““We don’t date. We get people married.” The app however, is encountering safety problems concerning fake accounts and bots, a problem for all dating apps. But there are more issues to consider for a marriage-minded app in India, because dating app users have had their photos taken and used for other purposes.

One such high-profile incident happened in 2022, where a group worked to scrape photos of prominent Indian Muslim women and uploaded them to a dating app “listing them at ‘auction’ with an attempt to humiliate them,” according to Rest of World. This kind of behavior could become more common without specific protocols and safety measures in place.