Good news boys and girls! If you’re on Tinder and you’re concerned someone could intercept your pictures as you upload them, you can now rest assured that it’s not possible.
Earlier this year, security firm Checkmarx found that Tinder didn’t have HTTPS encryption for photos uploaded on the app. Outraged by this being the case, Oregon Senator Ron Wyden, urged Tinder to fix it. Tinder responded by doing so back in February, but it was only recently that Tinder’s parent company Match Group let Senator Wyden know. If it hadn’t, we probably wouldn’t have known about this huge security flaw. So, what changed?
So, um, this is pretty weird. Apparently Senator Wyden just got Tinder to properly encrypt your swipe data, so you can all get it on in private. pic.twitter.com/BniAVUi77Q
— Matthew Green (@matthew_d_green) June 29, 2018
For users, nothing. I mean, you won’t notice anything different. However, you can now rest assured that photos sent between Tinder’s servers and the app itself are encrypted. Which means that if someone with bad intentions was on the same Wi-Fi network as you, they would theoretically be able to see any photos you uploaded, or add their own images into your account. It also means that this person may have also been able to see all your swipes and matches.
Photos have been encrypted, and swipe data is brought to exactly the same size, making it hard to differentiate one from another; and one action on the app from another. In its letter to Senator Wyden, Match Group explained,
“I want to assure you that protecting the private data of our users is a top priority. We take the security and privacy of our users seriously and employ a network of tools and systems to protect the integrity of our platform, including encryption.”
Now, my question is this? What is a US Senator doing asking Tinder to tighten its security? Strange times we live in.
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