Online dating is a great way to meet people your age in your area who are also looking to meet people. You can see a variety of pictures of them, their likes, dislikes, where they’re from, and more. It gives you pretty much everything you need to pick people who may be compatible with you. Perfect – right?
The problem is that all of it could be a lie. There is no verification process, no criminal background check, and no form of proof needed when creating a profile on the most popular dating sites. This means that anybody that you match with could be somebody completely different to who you thought.
14% of all sexual assaults happen on the first meeting of an online date, based on a study done by a professor at BYU. That is huge when you consider the millions of people that have been assaulted in their lives. 50% of the assaults that end in death are college students – that’s terrifying. This means you have to be so careful when meeting up with someone from one of these sites. Go somewhere pubic, tell friends where you are going, and look them up online.
There are also so many people looking to scam you- whether that be for money or something else. In the US from 2017 to 2021, $1.3 billion was lost alone to romance scams. And during the pandemic, there was an 80% increase in these types of scams, so $547 million was lost in 2021 alone. That’s a massive amount! These scams work because people can be so vulnerable online – they are looking for love and are therefore trusting of those who make them believe they have found it.
Dating apps produce positive results all of the time, so getting rid of them is not the answer. But you need to be careful when using them to make sure you know who you are talking to.