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Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

nytimes.com

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Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#91

Post by KibbutzDalia »

ravenstine wrote: post #73
fortran77 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be nice to have a dating site where potential matches were verified, including height, weight, and photo. Perhaps have them visit a kiosk in a participating business to get a photo taken from a standard angle (no "myspace" angles) along with a verified height and weight (stand on a scale!)

I see you're getting downvoted, which is funny because I've proposed the same idea on HN a few times and a lot of people thought it was a good idea. Maybe the weight thing isn't necessary with everything else in play, but otherwise I think this is something that should be tried. Yet nobody has bitten. Perhaps that means it's either not viable or of interest to investors.

People have a right to an “affectional preference.” The strange thing is that the same people who wouldn’t question the right of a man to not be attracted to women (for example) are most likely to be disturbed or that someone may have a weight preference.

Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#92

Post by inetknght »

dmarlow wrote: post #85
jdm2212 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do the same thing with a gmail address -- just do myemail+uniqueid@gmail.com, because gmail drops everything after the + for routing the email but still tells you which address it was sent to.

I used to do this, but I kept forgetting the "uniqueid" for the sites I used. I'd often resort to using my regular email for the forget password prompts and then would have to search my inbox to figure out the correct email (if using from another device where the creds aren't saved).

Today that problem is solved by the use of a password manager.

Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#93

Post by jdm2212 »

Splatter wrote: post #88
jdm2212 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do the same thing with a gmail address -- just do myemail+uniqueid@gmail.com, because gmail drops everything after the + for routing the email but still tells you which address it was sent to.

What's frustrating is that very many sites know of this method and simply trim the "+uniqueid" from a gmail.com address before inserting it into their database.

That's a bummer. FWIW there are a fair number of non-gmail domains that are gmail-backed (e.g. a lot of universities' email systems) so it should still work with those consistently I hope.

Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#94

Post by xyzzy_plugh »

zaroth wrote: post #7

TFA is a bit imprecise with the wording, so it's not exactly clear to me, but from what I understand, there's two different things that could be happening. In one case, a dating site company internally creates fake profiles and/or operates bots which cause the fake profiles to interact with real potential users in an attempt to get them to sign up. This is like what AM did on their site, where there weren't actually…

#2 sounds like a twisted symbiotic parasitic relationship, where the host is harmed indirectly through the harm of their users. Almost like some sort of systemic effect.

Fraud is such an interesting problem. Are the incentives ever truly aligned such that businesses should rigorously stamp out bad actors? Or, in a toxic twist, should they do the bare minimum to satisfy some regulatory body/their brand perception?

Treacherous times indeed.

Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#95

Post by guessmyname »

jdm2212 wrote: post #81
1024core wrote: post #67

Back when I was single, I was on a dozen dating sites. It was frustrating as heck to keep getting led on by fake profiles. eHarmony is the worst: they actually sold my email address to spammers. How do I know this? I have my own domain, and use a unique (hard to guess) email address for each site I have to give an email address to. So it was trivial to nail eHarmony as the culprit. Someone has already linked to the O…

I do the same thing with a gmail address -- just do myemail+uniqueid@gmail.com, because gmail drops everything after the + for routing the email but still tells you which address it was sent to.

I used to do this, but it is troublesome some times because some websites use libraries that strip or replace the plus sign and the final email ends up being an address that you don’t have access to.

Most of the time this is not a problem because you can create the account again with the correct email, but I have lost a few good usernames in some popular websites because I pulled this trick on them, Gravatar is one of these websites and the simplest one to explain.

I wanted a specific username that was available; I signed up with an email that looks like username+gravatar@gmail.com and the operation went through, then when I tried to log in, the website kept saying that the email was incorrect. I tried to reset the account using the username instead, which would force them to send a reset link to the email associated to this account, but the emails never arrive. I gave up that and other good usernames in many websites because of the inappropriate handling of email addresses by some popular web libraries.

Also, the same way you learnt this “trick” other programmers discovered it too and implemented a stripping algorithm to remove the unique ID during the registration process, so it is not very useful nowadays unless the website is very obscure and their developers either are rookies or do not have time to prevent this.

Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#96

Post by KibbutzDalia »

toastal wrote: post #66
fortran77 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be nice to have a dating site where potential matches were verified, including height, weight, and photo. Perhaps have them visit a kiosk in a participating business to get a photo taken from a standard angle (no "myspace" angles) along with a verified height and weight (stand on a scale!)

People wanting to flatter themselves? The nerve. Get off your high horse.

It’s making sure people are honest. I’m making no judgements. Some people use photos that aren’t even of them. Is that ok?

Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#97

Post by smt88 »

gowld wrote: post #21
smt88 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree and will add that all dating apps do things like this. They prey on lonely people using false hope. Tinder even introduced paid “boosts” (pay to be shown to users who otherwise might never see you), which is identical to a slot machine.

I don't think there's a problem with honestly offering a promotional feature. Personal responsibility still counts. If you want to pay to get your face out there, you deserve the right.

Sure, but the problem is that there's no transparency. You don't know if your boost showed you to 50 more people, 5 more, or 0.

Maybe you get a match during your boost. A random reward! And only Tinder knows whether your boost caused it or not.

There's very unilateral information in every transaction with dating apps, and that's the problem.

Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#98

Post by CuriouslyC »

toastal wrote: post #66
fortran77 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be nice to have a dating site where potential matches were verified, including height, weight, and photo. Perhaps have them visit a kiosk in a participating business to get a photo taken from a standard angle (no "myspace" angles) along with a verified height and weight (stand on a scale!)

People wanting to flatter themselves? The nerve. Get off your high horse.

You're missing the fact that deceptive profiles negatively impact the experiences of everyone they interact with.

Robbery? People just want to enrich themselves. Rape? People just want to pleasure themselves. The nerve of society to criminalize these behaviors, we should all get the fuck off our collective high horses.

Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#99

Post by dhnsmakala »

fortran77 wrote: post #55
chongli wrote: post #20

I think it's a fatal flaw in the dating site business model, to be honest. Their incentive is for you to stay on the site for as long as possible. If you could find a relationship quickly and then they would leave the site quickly. This would reduce the amount of ad and subscription revenue, in addition to reducing the size of the pool of "potential matches", discouraging those who have more trouble finding someone.

It would be nice to have a dating site where potential matches were verified, including height, weight, and photo. Perhaps have them visit a kiosk in a participating business to get a photo taken from a standard angle (no "myspace" angles) along with a verified height and weight (stand on a scale!)

Is people misrepresenting themselves something you encounter frequently? Seems like a short sighted move.

Re: Match.com Used Fake Ads to Swindle Users, F.T.C. Says

#100

Post by ddenisen »

jimmaswell wrote: post #64
lone_haxx0r wrote: post #47

Do you think that an open source dating app or a decentralized dating protocol would be a good idea?

Dating apps are a failed idea. If you're a man and have any imperfections appearance-wise you'll go on these sites and get no responses. In college I did hundreds of swipes and sent a bunch of messages on OKC and got nothing because I wasn't a human Ken doll. I could've spent all day in the gym and gotten plastic surgery and spent hundreds on whatever wardrobe was in style but why do all that for people who can't app…

So I've had an interesting experience recently. Like you, I've used Tinder and other dating apps fairly unsuccessfully in the past (close to zero matches, those who match don't respond, yadda yadda). I live in the US (West Coast), but I'm originally from Russia, and I finally got to go back home (a major Russian city) this summer for a few weeks' vacation. On a suggestion of a longtime friend I've met with there, I've created a Tinder profile. Just put up some mediocre photos of myself and listed my hobbies, mentioned I am visiting for a few weeks.

The difference from the US was quite startling. I got literally hundreds of likes and dozens of matches. (my like counter showed 99+ after a week). The matches weren't bots either. They were actual women, and a decent number of them responded to my messages. I've actually ended up meeting four different women in person during a time span of two weeks. We've had some good in person conversations and I still keep in touch with at least one of them. They didn't seem like they just wanted me so that I can bring them to the US, either, as that never came up in conversations and they seemed fairly happy where they currently are. I was honestly quite sad to leave and come home to the USA because it felt like I'm returning to a social wasteland.

Later, I've on a whim set my Tinder location to Philippines one night (might be going there for work this winter), and got a decent number of matches instantly, and the ones I've talked to responded willingly. I've also gotten a ton of matches when I was on vacation in Dominican Republic last winter.

Of course, if I use my actual location (Seattle) I still get basically zero matches. I've had similar low success in Western Europe.

So, your dating app status as a dude is really location dependent.

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