A relationship security app that permits girls to do background checks on males and anonymously share “crimson flag” behaviour has been hacked, exposing 1000’s of members’ pictures, posts and feedback.
Tea Courting Recommendation, a US-based women-only app with 1.6 million customers, mentioned there had been “unauthorised entry” to 72,000 pictures submitted by girls.
Some included pictures of ladies holding picture identification for verification functions, which Tea’s personal privateness coverage guarantees are “deleted instantly” after authentication.
Tea mentioned the breach affected members who signed up earlier than February 2024. It added it had “acted quick” and was “working with a few of the most trusted cyber safety specialists”.
The app has just lately skilled a surge in recognition – in addition to criticism from some who declare it’s anti-men.
Tea lets girls examine whether or not potential companions are married or registered intercourse offenders in addition to run reverse picture searches to guard towards “catfishing”, the place individuals use faux on-line identities.
However some of the controversial features of Tea is that it permits girls to share info on males they’ve dated to “keep away from crimson flags” but in addition spotlight these with “inexperienced flag” qualities.
The corporate mentioned the breached images “can by no means be linked to posts inside Tea”.
The agency blocks screenshots in order that posts usually are not shared exterior the app.
However on Friday it additionally admitted that a further 59,000 pictures from the app exhibiting posts, feedback and direct messages from over two years in the past had been accessed.
Tea mentioned: “We’re taking each step to guard this neighborhood – now and all the time.”
BBC Information has contacted Tea for remark.
The corporate was arrange in November 2022 by Sean Cook dinner, a software program engineer who mentioned he was impressed to create Tea after witnessing his mom’s on-line relationship experiences.
He advised Medium in Might: “I used to be shocked by how simple it was for catfish, scammers and criminals to benefit from girls on relationship apps and the way little conventional relationship apps do to guard customers.”
Nonetheless, some males – and girls – have challenged most of these teams claiming that they put males susceptible to invasion of privateness and defamation.
Earlier this 12 months, a person named Nikko D’Ambrosio took authorized motion towards Fb’s proprietor Meta due to a lot of statements made about him in a chat group known as “Are We Courting the Similar Man”.
The lawsuit was thrown out by a federal decide in Illinois.
