AI in dating apps 'a threat to authentic intimacy'

Navigating the world of dating apps can be tough enough on those looking for love, but academics say plans to introduce AI to help s craft their bios and hone their chat could make things even harder.

For the one in ten adults who used an online dating service in 2024, Luke Brunning from the Centre for Love, Sex and Relationships at the University of Leeds says the digital search for romance is fraught enough.

But after Match Group, which owns platforms including Tinder and Hinge, announced it was increasing investment in AI, he said he feared the course of true love may become even rougher and has written to the market-leading apps to urge caution.

"We should at least ask questions as a society about whether having tools writing things for us, changing our bios, editing our photos, whether that's actually facilitating authentic intimacy," he said.

"We should also think about whether that's going to cause problems for people that maybe don't usually use AI but find themselves in those spaces where it's quite commonly used.

"It is very easy for tech companies to kind of just innovate, innovate, innovate, change, change, change. But there is no real ethical oversight."

In a recent letter to shareholders, Match Group said it was "exploring several AI-driven features" including suggesting "shared interest-based date ideas when a conversation is ready to move from in-app to in-real-life".

It anticipates that AI functions could be used to improve conversational quality and maintain interactions with multiple s at once.

Match Group said that it was "developing features that enhance individual expression and the authenticity of human connections" but did not use bots to chat with s.

A spokesperson said: "Our AI work is rooted in helping s better showcase their personality and put their best foot forward in presenting themselves to potential matches.

"We want to increase confidence in the connections that they make online and help them meet in real life".

By introducing AI, Dr Brunning fears that without proper regulation, some younger people and the elderly may be especially vulnerable.

"These are companies that are having a huge impact on how people communicate, connect, share intimate information online and have changed how everyone meets each other over the past 15 years," he said.

"We need to have a think about all of this and think is this actually working for people?

"Is it having a negative impact on their mental health? And what should we do about it":[]}