Usually when I want to work something out of my system, I turn to writing. In fact, there’s an age-old saying, isn’t there? “Better off out than in”!
For me, it’s the same with my thought processes.
Sometimes, within our lifetime, we have to adapt from one thing to another and sometimes quickly and unexpectedly. When the Coronavirus pandemic struck, billions around the globe had to switch, overnight, from one condition to another. No one expected it, and no one knew how to deal or cope with it. We didn’t know how long it would last, and no one could have imagined the devastation that it would leave behind.
For the millions, and maybe billions, around the globe who found themselves in long distance relationships, and therefore reliant on the ability to travel to see their loved ones, they were thrown into a position where they had to find other solutions to keep their love alive.
I was one of those people, until very recently. Then, once again, the universe threw me a curve ball and I had to go from one state to another.
As my cousin put it, and pretty accurately I thought, love is great…. but when it’s no longer there it can be a pain. I envy folk who can just shrug their shoulders and go “meh” I’ll just move onto the next best thing and f*ck it out of my system. But that’s not me. I invest my time into that person, and that invested time also includes my trust.
The eagle eyed amongst you will have noticed, and let’s face it I’ve talked this before, that I have some significant trust issues...which is not altogether surprising. However over the last few years I’ve been working hard to address that. I think an ounce or two of suspicion is a reasonable thing, but sometimes it’s difficult for me not to allow that ounce…. to turn into a pound!
So today I picked up my phone, and reinstalled a couple of ‘well known’ dating apps. I looked at the first couple of thumbnails of guys looking for ‘whatever’, and thought “urrgh, there’s no way I’m ready for this yet!” and quickly put the phone down……actually I kind of threw it. Which in retrospect I wish I hadn’t, as it knocked my bedside clock onto the floor and now there’s a small (but annoying) crack on its face!
I come from generation Gaydar, which gay men of a certain age, will remember as being a gay dating website of the 90s. Back then it quite literally took over a minute to see a single picture of whatever stud you were interested in. These days you can swipe through LOADS of men in seconds, much in the same way as you might swipe through an online shopping app choosing whether to opt for branded frozen peas…. or the less expensive supermarket type.
It was one of these apps, or rather a website, that caused a significant amount of damage to my own life years ago. The fundamentals haven’t changed very much, ‘Person A’ asks ‘Person B’ if they have “more” pictures to share. ‘Person B’ usually reciprocates with “more” pictures, desperate for a bit of action, and eventually (if you’re lucky) it all ends with a f*ck. ‘Person A’ and ‘Person B’ walk away, with nothing more to be said and onwards and upwards to the next best thing.
But sometimes ‘Person A’ betrays the trust of ‘Person B’ and shares images of their sexual encounter with others. In so doing they have fundamentally taken a basic human requirement for physical contact, and weaponised it against the other party. That’s what we call Intimate Image Abuse or Image Based Sexual Abuse (IBSA)
Although my foray back into the world of dating applications (today) was brief, it didn’t take me long to see that as far as online safety was concerned - there’s still precious little on offer.
This weekend the Belgian LGBTQ community held a Covid-19 secure vigil for a 42-year-old man who was brutally attacked and killed by three minors, aged between 16 and 17. He was attacked because of his sexuality, he was attacked because he was gay. The gay dating app Grindr was used to organise the attack. It was an example of technology facilitated abuse at its very worst.
You can be whoever you want to be online, older, younger, taller, smaller. In fact, it took me, what, maybe 1 minute and 30 seconds to create a ‘basic’ profile. At no point was I challenged to prove my age, surely the most basic of online safety requirements?!?
With that ‘basic’ profile I could take screenshots of other people’s profile pictures, which I could then potentially upload to my own profile or use in order to create a new profile that is entirely fake altogether.
The only point that you will be asked to prove who you are, is if you lose access to your account or if another user has made an accusation of account impersonation. Why isn’t this done at the very outset of account creation?
Grindr's Terms of Service state distinctly, and I quote, "Grindr services are available for individuals aged 18 years or older."
Grindr fail miserably to adhere to even their own terms of service, and as a consequence a man has lost his life.
At least with Grindr, I had to provide my mobile phone number for a ‘verification’ of sorts. With Scruff, I didn’t even have to do that! In fact, I was up and running in 20 seconds flat!
So, it’s not just Grindr that’s at fault here, it’s every technology driven dating application. Why aren’t we screaming and shouting and demanding more, or better?
One way or the other you are paying for these applications, either through subscriptions or via the data mining that they’re performing in the background. Everything from location checks, to collecting stored cookies that define what type of material you search for via Safari, Chrome or whatever phone browser you prefer.
Invariably that information, ‘your’ information, is then sold onto other parties. Grindr have been proven guilty of this several times in the past. But then the Chinese tech company Beijing Kunlun Tech own 60% of that business…which was acquired for $93 million dollars. There’s big money to be made from other people’s loneliness.
Perhaps if the gay community were less interested in frivolous application improvements, for instance I noted that one user had suggested (on Grindr’s improvement list) an organisation of profile pictures in terms of knob size (I am NOT kidding you), and spent more time asking for what we’re entitled to (i.e. protection and safety) we would have better and safer online platforms.
A homophobic attack on one of own, wherever they are in the world, is an attack on all of us. It attacks the very fabric of who we are, and what we believe in. By that token you could argue that an abusive attack on one of our own, by one of our own, is many several times worse.
And yet, gay related image abuse attacks are exactly this.
It’s not enough to merely show an interest in technology facilitated abuse, after it’s happened. By that point, it’s all too late, and a loved one may have been lost as a consequence.
So how many more attacks, image related or otherwise, does it take for us to push application developers and their owners to provision something that is so desperately lacking and desperately required?
I’m aware that Grindr provides enhanced safety to those that are able to pay for it, but why is online safety something that comes at a cost? Aren’t they making enough money out of us in the first instance?
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