Features

Chemistry Forever aims to “disrupt” the dating app market in India by offering AI Face Verification to curb the proliferation of fake profiles.

The new app is coming out strong in terms of security, which has plagued the dating app industry for years. According to The Hindustan Times, the app has had over 10,000 downloads in its first two months (it had a soft launch in September of last year). So far most of the profiles on the app are verified, though users have the choice to opt-in for Face Verification. 

According to the company’s website, the registration process is simple. After downloading the app, it asks the user to upload a recent profile photo (to be verified later in the process), and offers users “stars” for each completed step of the process to make their profiles more appealing and complete.

Hinge Wrapped Homepage

A new TikTok-inspired website can help singles to examine their dating life over the past year to help them have a better experience in 2023.

Hinge Wrapped was inspired by the TikTok viral videos dubbed Dating Wrapped that had users posting their best and worst dating experiences in 2022.

According to HITC.com, a TikTok user posted a video where he showed a dating recap of his time on Hinge, captioning it “Hinge is unhinged.” He shows himself to be a “night owl swiper” and goes over the number of likes he sent and his most-liked photo. He said he’s been to seven different places trying to find love.

Thanks to this viral video, Hinge Unwrapped was born, though the actual website was created by Canadian software engineer Niko Draca (not the company Hinge). He said that he created the website to help daters reflect on the highlights of their experiences on the app, and so far, people are flocking to use it.

Tinder announced the launch of its newest feature Relationship Goals, offering users more clarity and insight into what potential matches are looking for.

Relationship Goals will be part of the user’s profile, where they can display their dating goals. Some of the choices offered in the dropdown box include whether they’re looking for a “long-term partner,” “long-term, but open to short-term,” “short-term, but open to long,” “short-term fun,” “new friends” or “still figuring it out,” according to Tech Crunch.

Each description comes with an added emoji and is displayed as a highlighted banner at the top of the user’s profile, above the “About Me” section. According to Tech Crunch, Tinder will also offer weekly prompts to users asking if their relationship goals have changed and to make that change on their profiles for more clarity and transparency, an acknowledgement that attitudes and goals shift over time.

Image: Bumble

Dating app Bumble hopes to share more positivity over its app with the launch of its new feature Compliments.

According to Tech Crunch, Compliments lets a user write a compliment to another user, even before they match. The recipient will be notified of an unread compliment when they log in to the app, putting it front and center. Each user is allowed one message per day to send in the Compliments feature.

To send someone a Compliment, users can look through a person’s profile and see what they would like to message about. The Compliment can be sent on whatever strikes a chord – something they wrote in their bio, a profile prompt response, or anything else. When the user has a Compliment in mind, they can click on the yellow icon at the bottom left corner of a profile (with a heart inside of a speech bubble), and a text box will open where the Compliment can be written. There is a limit of 150 characters per Compliment.

An Illinois Court will hear a case against Match Group’s Tinder app over how it collects and stores the biometric data of its users.

According to Global Dating Insights, the way Tinder stores sensitive data such as physical characteristics and body measurements violate the state’s Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA). Tinder (and parent company Match Group) failed to gather signed consent from Illinois users before retaining facial scans. This data is collected as part of Tinder’s photo verification feature, a new safety measure launched by the company to help reduce fake profiles and potential scammers on the app.

Illinois has specific regulations regarding not only the storage of the biometric data, but also disclosing information to the user about how that data will be handled and managed. Specifically, the plaintiffs allege that Tinder’s process poses a security risk because of what might happen if the data were to be obtained by hackers. As Global Dating Insights points out, biometric data is extremely sensitive data as it is a permanent identifier of the user, as opposed to passwords which can be changed.

Image: Hinge

Dating app Hinge is venturing outside of traditional monogamy offerings on its app to launch its newest feature “Relationship Type,” where users can specify what kind of relationship they are looking for.

According to Tech Crunch, Relationship Type categories include “monogamous,” “non-monogamous” and “figuring out my relationship type.” This update allows for easier filtering through matches, though it is optional to add it to your profile. It will be posted in the “virtues” section of the profile.

This feature expands on the “Dating Intentions” feature that Hinge launched over the summer, where users could specify whether they were looking for long-term or short-term partners, or if they didn’t know. Now, they can do the same for non-monogamous preferences. As Tech Crunch pointed out, there is also room to better explain your relationship goals through the app’s “Backstory” open text option.