Bumble Inc

Match Group and Bumble CEOs

The CEOs of dating companies Match Group and Bumble have created relief funds for people in Texas affected by the new abortion ban.

The new law, also known as SB8, prevents women from having abortions after six weeks, long before most women know they are pregnant and effectively banning them altogether. In addition, citizens have been empowered and incentivized to bring civil lawsuits against anyone involved in assisting a woman getting an abortion, including doctors, family members, and even rideshare drivers. As a result, the female CEOs of two dating companies based in Texas – Match Group and Bumble – are fighting back on behalf of women by setting up funds to help people receive care out of state.

According to CNBC, Match Group’s CEO Shar Dubey announced that she will personally finance and help the company’s Texas-based employees receive out of state care if they need it. Bumble’s Whitney Wolfe Herd announced the company will create a fund for people in Texas who need access to care and send the money to organizations that support reproductive rights. 

Image: Hello Sunshine

Dating app Bumble has partnered with Reese Witherspoon’s production company Hello Sunshine and Baileys Irish Cream Liqueur to produce three short films on romances inspired by real-life Bumble users.

According to Deadline, the film series is currently branded as “Meet Cute” vignettes, featuring three female and non-binary filmmakers. Bumble and Hello Sunshine are both platforms that elevate women and LGBTQ+ voices.

The filmmakers - Carly Usdin, Sadé Clacken Joseph, and Haroula Rose – will all be taking these real-life stories and retelling them in their own unique voices.

Dating app Bumble’s platform was found to have a security vulnerability capable of leaking the exact locations of its users, putting them at risk of potential attackers.

The researcher who discovered the security flaw created two fake profiles, one for the “attacker” and one for the “victim,” to check vulnerabilities in the app’s API. He was able to bypass signature checks for API requests, which meant he got around Bumble’s paywall to execute the attack.

His test revealed the exact location and the distance of the fake victim from the fake attacker through a process of trilateration, according to security trade magazine The Daily Swig. In other words, he figured out how the app calculated and matched approximate user locations by rounding down the exact distance they are from each other. 

Dating app Bumble is taking another step to address concerns of abuse and harassment on its female-friendly platform: offering trauma services for those who need help.

The company partnered with remote trauma support site Bloom, operated by non-profit Chayn in the U.K., to offer free therapeutic services to users, according to Mashable. Bloom provides online courses on mental health topics for survivors of sexual assault and harassment, such as managing anxiety.

In addition to Bloom’s online courses, Bumble users can receive up to six therapy sessions and can chat online with therapists when they need. Chayn’s therapists are trained in sexual assault and trauma therapy, and some are survivors themselves, according to Mashable. 

Dating app users flocked to dating apps during the month of July, setting a new record for activity and engagement, according to a recent study from Apptopia.

The app research firm has been collecting data since 2015 and found that active daily users on the most popular dating apps – including Tinder and Bumble – jumped to almost 15 million in July, an all-time high, as reported by Bloomberg. 

This follows news from media outlets anticipating a “hot vax summer,” where singles were getting ready to meet dates in person again after a series of lockdowns due to the Covid-19 pandemic. With the distribution of vaccines on the rise, especially in the U.S., U.K. and Australia, dating app users were getting vaccinated and flocking to apps to connect and schedule dates. 

Popular dating apps like Tinder and Bumble that operate in Australia and New Zealand are starting to add vaccination badges as a new profile feature to entice people to match and date. Bumble is rolling its badge out at the end of July, while Tinder is still a few weeks away.

The apps have already rolled out this popular feature in the U.S. and U.K., and now that Australians and New Zealanders are signing up to receive a vaccine, they will be expanding the feature to offer it in these countries, too. 

According to The Guardian, only 11 percent of Australians are fully vaccinated, which might make it more difficult for dating apps to offer as an incentive to match, at least for now. The Astro-Zeneca vaccine is available to eligible adults in the countries, but many are opting to wait for Pfizer, which remains in limited supply. But Australia and New Zealand are ahead of the game - many countries are still waiting for any vaccine dosages to become available for their populations.