Tinder

A Facebook engineer was fired for exploiting his position and access to personal information of Facebook users, according to website Tech Crunch. It’s reported that the firing resulted after the engineer’s messages with a match on Tinder were shared with company executives.

Over Twitter, Spyglass Security Founder Jackie Stokes revealed that someone she knew received “creepy messages” over Tinder, and she had confirmed it was an engineer employed by Facebook.

Stokes then posted a screenshot of the offender’s message, where he called himself a “professional stalker” and claimed to have access to the user’s personal data. He also shared private information about the user via their messages, information that she hadn’t shared publicly on social media.

It wasn’t long ago that dating services were seen as the last refuge of the lovelorn and desperate. Today online dating hasn’t merely shed its stigma, it’s a bona fide phenomenon and business appears to be booming.

According to a report from IBISWorld, annual revenue in the online dating industry has surpassed $3 billion. Dating services employed over 9,000 people worldwide in 2017 and have collectively seen an annual growth rate of +5.3% over the past five years.

Yet hardly a week goes by without someone publishing an article condemning digital dating for butchering our ability to have real relationships, and even major players like Match Group have fallen short of analysts’ expectations.

Tinder changed the game when it popularized the swipe. Now the company is hoping a new movement-based feature will keep it on top of the mobile dating heap. Introducing Loops, two-second looping videos that promise to put more personality in profiles and “set your swipe game in motion.”

“Loops represents the next step in the evolution of our classic profile,” Brian Norgard, Chief Product Officer at Tinder, said in a statement. “With the addition of video, users have a new way to express themselves while also gaining key insights into the lives of potential matches. Whether it’s dancing at a concert, doing cartwheels on the beach, or clinking glasses with friends, Loops makes profiles come alive.”

Like Vine (RIP) and Boomerang before them, Loops allow users to upload videos from their phone and trim the footage within the app. The result is a short, repetitive clip that gives users another way of expressing their most dateable selves.

Tinder crashed for several hours on April 4^th after Facebook implemented new privacy and security restrictions, frustrating and confusing millions using the dating app.

Facebook has been facing increased scrutiny from the U.S. government after discovering major security breaches of its members’ personal information by third parties. Most recently, Facebook faced serious accusations after it was discovered that prominent research firm Cambridge Analytica stole Facebook user information from about 87 million users, including information about their political beliefs, without their knowledge or consent.

Facebook has since taken action to correct course, implementing more restrictions on its third party advertisers and partners to limit the amount of information they can access. Facebook previously allowed apps like Tinder to request user data automatically, but now that isn’t the case. Unfortunately for Tinder, this meant its users faced login errors and weren’t able to access the app at all.

Bumble has filed a $400 million lawsuit against Match Group, the parent company of popular dating apps such as Tinder, OkCupid, and Match. Bumble accused Match Group of interfering with its business operations, including stealing trade secrets and hurting the company’s chance to sell equity investments, according to reports from CNN Tech and Recode.

The Bumble lawsuit follows a previous lawsuit filed by Match Group against Bumble two weeks prior. Match Group accused the female-friendly dating app of patent infringement, specifically in regard to its swiping technology, stating that it is virtually identical to Tinder.

Bumble initially responded to the lawsuit with a post on its website, stating: “We swipe left on your attempted scare tactics, and on these endless games. We swipe left on your assumption that a baseless lawsuit would intimidate us. Given your enduring interest in our company, we expected you to know us a bit better by now.”

Facebook has come under fire, with many longtime users debating whether or not to delete their accounts, rather than make their personal information vulnerable to third parties. But something you might not have considered, brought to light by a reporter from Mashable, is how deleting Facebook might affect your love life.

Many dating apps rely on Facebook to verify profile information – that is, to make sure you really are a person and not a bot or an advertisement. With this in mind, many apps require that you use your Facebook account to login, including Tinder, Bumble, Hinge, and other really popular apps.

Research firm Cambridge Analytica was accused of hijacking data from 50 million Facebook users and using the data to influence the 2016 U.S. election. This information breach was made possible because Facebook relies on third parties for ad revenue, and also partners with research firms like Cambridge Analytica, which leaves its platform open to security problems. Facebook maintains it didn’t know about the information grab, though evidence has come to light via whistleblower Christopher Wylie, who developed the strategy for hijacking and using the data to create targeted political profiles of Americans.