Are dating apps safe? Grindr, Tinder, Bumble and Hinge under scrutiny

A 28-year-old art consultant in Bengaluru has stopped using dating apps. Grindr suited his busy career and frequent travels, offering a convenient way to meet people without committing to serious dating. He kept his face off his public profile because he isn’t completely out to his family, sharing intimate photographs instead through the app’s private albums.

Then he discovered that the images had been circulated and used on three other Grindr profiles. Professional acquaintances began messaging him to ask whether the profiles were his. The possibility that his sexuality could be exposed to his family frightened him enough to abandon the apps. The precise method by which the images were copied remains unverified, but the experience left him questioning how private his private photographs really were.

In Hyderabad, a woman who met a man on Hinge, exchanged numbers and followed him on Instagram began receiving repeated alerts about attempts to access her Instagram account. The man travelled frequently, including to Indore and Bengaluru; she noticed that some locations associated with the suspicious activity appeared to correspond with his reported travels.

Shubham Singh, a Mumbai-based cybersecurity expert, says online sextortion is a serious pattern he has encountered. “Criminals manipulate victims into sharing intimate photographs or participating in video calls, record the material and threaten to circulate it among friends, family or social-media followers unless they pay,” he says. Shubham distinguishes sextortion, which involves threats to extract money or other benefits, from revenge porn, which involves the non-consensual distribution of intimate content, often to humiliate or retaliate against someone.

A woman uses a dating app
| Photo Credit:
AndreyPopov

He also describes a disturbing variation involving digital-arrest scams. In one case he encountered, a woman was manipulated by someone impersonating a female police officer during a video call. She was instructed to remove her clothes under the pretext of verifying body marks mentioned in an FIR. The criminals allegedly recorded the footage and used it to blackmail her for money. Shubham says these schemes exploit the same psychological levers: impersonation, fear, humiliation and the threat of exposure.

The risks extend beyond individual criminals. Grindr has faced international scrutiny over its advertising-data practices. In October, Norway’s data protection authority fined Microsoft’s advertising technology subsidiary Xandr NOK 92 million for unlawfully processing Grindr users’ data in advertising auctions between July 2018 and April 2020. Advertising identifiers and IP addresses associated with Grindr use could reveal sexual orientation, the regulator found. The historical ruling does not establish that Indian users were affected by the specific conduct.

Match Group, the parent company of Tinder, Hinge and The League, has partnered with the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C) under the Ministry of Home Affairs to launch a romance-scam awareness campaign. The initiative will educate users on spotting red flags, verifying matches and recognising financial scams that may unfold over weeks or months. Tinder offers Face Check and reporting tools, while Hinge has introduced Face Check, screenshot protection and a block list in India. Bumble also provides photo and ID verification, in-app calls and tools to blur explicit images. Users targeted by cybercrime can report incidents at cybercrime.gov.in or call 1930.

Dating apps are rife with fake profiles
| Photo Credit:
Techa Tungateja

For trans women and other transgender and gender-diverse users, exposure can carry additional consequences. India’s TransNET project, based on interviews with 14 transgender, non-binary and gender-diverse people, documented doxxing, stalking, surveillance, non-consensual image-sharing and dating violence. In Kerala in 2025, police reportedly apprehended four people suspected of using Grindr to rob and extort LGBTQIA+ users; investigators suspected hundreds may have been targeted, though this was not a verified victim count.

Dating apps cannot guarantee that every stranger will behave well. But companies that encourage users to share intimate information must be transparent about its handling, respond effectively to abuse and explain the limits of their safeguards. As Shubham’s cases illustrate, criminals do not need sophisticated hacking tools when fear itself can be weaponised.

A swipe takes a second, but recovering control over your photographs, your account or a private part of your life can take considerably longer.

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