Is sharing always caring?
- Khanh Nguyen
- Sep 21, 2020
- 3 min read
Digital communication is becoming addicted to young adults which include online dating apps, it’s becoming a familiar thing for Generation Z and Millennial around the world nowadays. There are many apps currently running and attracting a lot of users that are Bumble, OkCupid, Grindr, Hinge, Zoosk, MeetMe and especially Tinder, one of the world most famous popular dating app for men and women (Simple Texting, 2020) with 57 million users around the world (Iqbal, 2020). With the privacy’s problem currently a big concern for internet users, sharing personal information to strangers online is not a safe thing to do, especially when using online dating apps.
When they say sharing is caring but sharing information on dating apps seems to not always caring, especially when young adults don't care about their online privacy and information (OAIC, 2017). Dating apps store more than just basic information that people fill when they sign up, there are also sensitive data and images that users send during the conversation. Those data would be a juicy target for cybercriminal (Malwarebytes Labs, 2020) where it is not hard for them to get when the online security is not tight and what people based on is only trust in the other person. People would not trust a random stranger talk about themselves on the street then they also should not trust some stranger online and send them sensitive information before knowing them well.
Source: SimpleTexting
In Paris 2017, a journalist asked Tinder for her past and current data, they then sent back to her 800 pages of her deepest, darkest secret (Duportail, 2017) which scared her off about what they were going to do with those data not just only to her but also other million users out there. Another study in England found that Grindr and Okcupid spread personal data where they sell insight information of users on their behaviours and location to marketing and advertising companies which got shared to at least 135 third parties (Williams, 2020). It is clearly shown that dating apps know their users better than they do and sharing information on those dating apps would ham people in many ways.
While 25% of dating app users around the world share their real information publicly which include home address, and naked photos, there are a large number which roughly 57% dating app users admitted that they lie about their marital status and appearance (kaspersky, 2020). Strangers can easily locate a profile based on their pre-fill information on those apps and this is where cybercriminal can swing by and take dating app users' disadvantages. Cybercriminal includes blackmail, online abuse when sextortion becomes more and more creative (Tsing, 2019).
With the disadvantage of digital communication is peer pressure, cyberbullying and sextortion, there are also ways to prevent users from getting the least information spread out. Firstly, check all the apps settings before signing up and their privacy policies to see how they are dealing with personal information and third parties (Malwarebytes Labs, 2020). To protect sensitive information, users should not sign up with a real email so those cybercriminals harder to get your information or especially apps that sell your information to third parties. To limit location data shared, app users can also bring the conversation out of those dating apps to another platform to be safer (Harold, 2020).
Reference:
Duportail, J. (2017, 09 26). Tinder. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/sep/26/tinder-personal-data-dating-app-messages-hacked-sold
Harold. (2020, 02 14). Online dating and privacy: Will it ever be a match? Retrieved from https://www.expressvpn.com/blog/online-dating-and-privacy/
Iqbal, M. (2020, 06 23). Tinder Revenue and Usage Statistics. Retrieved from https://www.businessofapps.com/data/tinder-statistics/
kaspersky. (2020). online-dating-report. Retrieved from kaspersky: https://www.kaspersky.com/blog/online-dating-report/
Malwarebytes Labs. (2020). Cyber tips for safe online dating: How to avoid privacy gaffs, exploits, and scams . Retrieved from https://blog.malwarebytes.com/privacy-2/2020/02/cyber-tips-safe-online-dating/
OAIC. (2017). Australian Community Attitudes to Privacy Survey 2017. Retrieved from https://www.oaic.gov.au/updates/videos/australian-community-attitudes-to-privacy-survey-2017/
Simple Texting. (2020). Dating Apps: Just for Hookups? Retrieved from https://simpletexting.com/dating-app-survey/
Tsing, W. (2019). Sextortion scammers getting creative. Retrieved from https://blog.malwarebytes.com/cybercrime/2019/11/sextortion-scammers-getting-creative/
Williams, R. (2020, 01 15). Tinder, Grindr sell personal data in possible violation of privacy laws, study says . Retrieved from https://www.mobilemarketer.com/news/tinder-grindr-sell-personal-data-in-possible-violation-of-privacy-laws-st/570452/
Reply to @3782310
Hi there, thanks so much for visiting my page and agree with me on the point of dating apps, i think it is important nowadays that most adult is on it and this issue this be raised up so more people know and aware of what happen to their action so they need to be careful.
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Very insightful blog post Khanh, really liked how you centred the discussion around dating apps, especially when conceding that a lot of people don't think about the negative implications of those applications and their privacy.
Reply to @s3811996
Hi there, thank so much for retuning on my site and love my discussion. I do think it’s important that people ready up the policies before entering anything which would prevent them in their action in the future.
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Reply to @zanevenpletzen
Thank Zane for agreeing with me on this point. I do take this issue very seriously as well as it’s online and it is very hard to identify who is the person we talk with and we can talk with many like that in one day. We would not know when we got treat from them.
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Reply to @103118919
Totally agreed on your point especially nowadays cybercriminals is growing and it is totally not easy to catch them. When your private information got leak out, it is very hard to get them back.
I also have other blogs posted that relevant to social media topics, please visit if you have time or subscribe to my page to receive new blog alert from my site.