Think dating apps erase your personal data when you delete your account? According to a recent study by Avast, it is not. Most keep them for several days, or even keep some indefinitely.
In 2021, dating applications will be widely democratized. A large part of the population uses them and today they have become as popular as social networks. Like the latter, they require a certain amount of personal data to function correctly: gender, age, location, search… This is a whole lot of information that must be provided to access the list of singles in your region.
But, unlike social networks, dating apps are ultimately doomed to be uninstalled. One could then think that all these data provided disappear when one deletes his account. Avast took an interest in the matter to find out. The firm behind the world famous antivirus discovered thata good deal of information is kept even after the application has been started.
What do dating apps do with your personal data?
For its study, Avast focused on three of the most popular dating apps: Match, Grindr et Bumble. In its privacy policy, the first specifies sharing certain data for "limited and critical purposes, including for corporate audits, analyzes and consolidated reports, to comply with applicable law and to help ensure the safety of users. ". On the other hand, she assures thatno commercial use is made of this data.
On Grindr's side, things are getting more complicated. The platform has often been pinned for the poor protection it offers to its users, especially in countries virulent towards the LGBT + community. What is more, it collects a large amount of data, among which HIV status and profile pictures (sometimes stripped). As of April 2020, Grindr has implemented a new privacy policy, which has reduced the storage time for messages to 48 hours, videos to 14 days and anonymous photos to 120 days. Once the account is deleted, all data is erased within 7 days.
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Bumble, finally, collects "the names of users, at least one photo, date of birth, gender, type of relationship they are looking for, profession, education, if they are interested in meeting during the restrictions related to Covid, city of residence, hometown, occupation, astrological sign, alcohol consumption, smoking, pets, what the user is looking for, whether they want children or not , religion, political position and content of messages, ”says Avast. The application shares this data with third-party applications for "research and analysis" purposes but claims not to sell them.
How to remove all of your personal data from a dating app?
Emma McGowan, the researcher behind the study, sought to contact those apps. Only Match responded by redirecting it to its privacy policy. "Once you delete your account, the account is no longer visible on the service", we can read there. “From there, we remove information that is subject to our legitimate interests, including legal obligations to retain data for litigation purposes and to work to eliminate malicious people and keep them away from our platforms. "
It is difficult to know for sure whether or not Match keeps user data after deleting the account. So it remains for the latter to make sure you have closed their account and not just hide from other members before uninstalling the application. It will then be necessary to wait for the regulatory period before seeing his profile entirely deleted from the platform. "If a person lives […] in Europe and the United Kingdom, they are protected by the GDPR," adds Emma McGowan, before specifying that she has the right to demand the deletion of all this data. "Some will comply without hesitation, while you may have to be ardent in defending your rights with others!" "
