In Paris, dating apps want to protect athletes from forced “outing”

Photo: Jung Yeon-je Agence France-Presse “Dating apps are obviously accessible within the village, but geolocation has been disabled by some app publishers,” the Olympic Organizing Committee confirmed to French gay magazine “Têtu.”

Kilian Fichou – Agence France-Presse in Paris

Published and updated on July 26

• Europe

More users but also more risks: dating apps have limited their functionality in certain areas and are issuing warnings before the start of the Paris Olympics, particularly to protect athletes from forced “outing“.

“This feature is unfortunately not available,” says the gay dating app Grindr when you try to geolocate yourself in the athletes' village, located in Saint-Denis, north of Paris, where nearly 10,000 athletes live and which has a reputation for being a hotspot for meeting people.

“Dating apps are obviously accessible within the village, but geolocation has been disabled by some app publishers,” the Olympic Organizing Committee confirmed to the French gay magazine Têtu.

Grindr normally allows its users to position themselves wherever they want on a world map, thus displaying all the profiles in a specific geographic area.

For an athlete who would not have made his coming outor coming from a country where homosexuality is repressed, “using Grindr may expose you to the risk of being unmasked by curious people who could try to identify you on the application,” the American company warned in a publication on its site Wednesday.

Limited features

A restriction already in force during the Beijing Winter Games in 2022, recalls the app, which has limited other features within the Olympic village (profiles are hidden from any search carried out via another location, the display of the distance from which a user is located is disabled by default, screenshots of profiles or conversations are blocked).

Measures taken after several incidents which have highlighted this risk of exposure non-consensual treatment for LGBTQ+ athletes in recent years.

During the Rio Olympics in 2016, the American website The Daily Beast published an article — since removed — in which a journalist recounted his encounters with athletes approached on Grindr, containing details that could potentially identify them.

“This problem mainly concerns Grindr,” a spokesperson for the Tinder app, which saw its use increase by 350% at the Pyeongchang Winter Games in South Korea in 2018, told AFP on Friday.

He indicates that, unlike its competitor, Tinder (which belongs to the American dating site giant Match Group) does not allow you to locate yourself at a specific location, but “only within a perimeter” of at least two kilometers, and that “mutual consent” is necessary to contact another user.

Reinforced security

However, the company points out that features exist such as “incognito” mode, which allows the user to only appear on profiles that they he himself selected.

“This is one of the features quite used by the LGBTQIA+ communities,” notes Tinder, “especially for people still thinking about their sexual orientation or gender identity”.

A nevertheless paid option on Tinder and other dating apps, such as Grindr, Fruitz or Bumble.

For its part, the French app Happn, which focuses on people encountered “in real life” during the day, said on Friday that it had “strengthened” its security measures during the Games, “with dedicated teams available 24/7 to ensure the safety of all users, including athletes.”

“We also allow geolocation to be deactivated for those who wish,” it also stressed.

According to data reported by its teams, Happn claims to have observed “changes in behavior and an increase in interactions” between its users in recent days, reflecting “a desire among singles to meet people thanks to this event.” »

Some 240,000 condoms are being distributed to Olympic athletes this year, a tradition dating back to the 1988 Olympics and intended to combat the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, including AIDS.