Profiles

Match Group and its partner Garbo, a nonprofit provider of background checks, have parted ways, according to a story that broke in The Wall Street Journal.

Garbo announced in a blog post that it will be shutting down its consumer-facing business as a result of the split. While details were not shared about exactly what happened, Garbo blamed Match Group for both the difference in priorities and the execution of the service on its platform.

Garbo’s service was integrated into Match Group’s Tinder platform and allowed users run background checks on potential dates using just a name and phone number. Garbo would give them a report stating if the person had any public reports issued against them for past violence, arrests, convictions and restraining orders.

Dating app Bumble is releasing new features for its free and premium services, aimed at fostering a kinder, more curated dating experience, according to the company’s press release.

Mashable noted that one of the new features is Review Before You Send, and will be part of its Compliments feature. While Compliments is intended to encourage positive interactions over the app, sometimes the message isn’t received well, no matter the intention of the sender. In fact, as Bumble tested Review Before You Send, they found that 46 percent of people chose to edit their Compliment after they received the prompt, because it encouraged them to reread their message and think twice about sending it.

Another new feature the app is launching allows users to add their interests to the top of their profile (modeled after the app’s hit “Top Artists” feature, where a favorite band or singer is placed front and center in a user’s profile).

Parents in China are taking matters into their own hands with their single adult children and using dating apps to help them find someone to marry.

Parent-facing dating apps are taking off in China, according to Rest of World, which reports on tech trends globally. Many parents are using online matchmaking platforms like Perfect In-Laws, Family-Building Matchmaking, and Parents Matchmaking to set up dates for their grown and unmarried children.

On platforms like these, the parents set up profiles for their children, sometimes without their knowledge or consent, according to Rest of World. When the match is made, it’s the parents who meet and get to know each other first, similar to matchmaking apps used in India.

Dating app Tinder is testing an AI feature that will select the best profile photos for users, according to reports from parent company Match Group’s latest earnings call.

Tech Crunch noted that the AI feature will examine a Tinder member’s photo album and select five that “best represents them for their dating profile.” According to Match Group CEO Bernard Kim, choosing pictures is a stressful process for daters, and typically they have doubts about which ones they pick, what he labeled as a “pain point” on the earnings call.

“Sometimes, people are really excited to jump into the Tinder experience,” Kim said. He continued: “then in that exact moment where you upload five pictures, people get generally nervous or uncomfortable, like, ‘What is the right picture that I’ve taken over the last year to make my dating profile more me?’”

A massive leak of 2.3 million dating app records, including personal information from over 260,000 dating app users and 969,571 images and private chats were exposed to the public, according to SC Media.

The data breach included extremely sensitive information, including sexually explicit private photos, recollections of sexual experiences, and details about previous sexual encounters that were tied to dating app user profiles, according to Hack Read, a security news website.

The leak primarily affected users of 419 Dating – Chat & Flirt app, which is based in Hong Kong but has users around the world. Other apps were also compromised, including Meet You – Local Dating App and Speed Dating App for American by MyCircle Network Corp, but these are thought to be linked to the same group of developers as 419 Dating.

Image: Bumble

Dating app Bumble has partnered with the much buzzed-about Warner Bros. movie Barbie, which premieres in July in theaters across the world.

Bumble’s partnership is to promote its new Compliments feature using images of the movie’s stars to bolster confidence and encourage people to try it out, according to marketing news website Campaign Asia. In addition to images, the app will have pre-recorded messages from the stars to motivate users to engage positively with each other.

Barbie, played by Margot Robbie, has a dialog bubble on Bumble’s app that states: “your taste in movies? Sensational. Now it’s time to show them how sensational your Compliments are.” Other stars featured include Simu Liu (Ken #2) and Issa Rae (President Barbie), and Ryan Gosling (Ken #1).