Grindr can be used in the Olympic Games Village and other areas, but its location-based features have been disabled.
The use of Grindr, the US dating app for sexual and gender minorities, has been restricted during the Summer Olympics in Paris. The service tells you about it on their website.
The purpose of the restrictions is to protect the privacy of athletes who have not gone public with their sexual orientation or who come from countries where, for example, homosexuality is prohibited by law.
According to Grindr, there is a risk that third parties may seek to identify and expose athletes who use the app.
Grindr does work in the Olympic Village and other areas used by athletes, but its location-based use has been blocked for the duration of the Games.
Among other things, the features explore and roam, which allow you to browse Grindr users staying in the area, basically from anywhere in the world, are disabled.
By default, information that tells you how far the other user is physically is also disabled. However, you can turn this back on if you wish.
In addition, users of the free subscription can exceptionally send an unlimited number of instantly disappearing messages and cannot take screenshots of images and conversations.
Problems in previous races
Grindr also restricted the use of its app in China during the Beijing Winter Olympics in 2022.
– This is our way of ensuring that LGBTQ+ athletes can meet each other authentically without worrying about stalkers or unwanted attention, the service writes on its website.
Grindr began to think more closely about the privacy protection of Olympic athletes after a journalist from the US online media called Daily Beast wrote in 2016 I’m talking about ithow the athletes met each other through Grindr at the Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
The story did not reveal the names of the athletes who used the app, but it was widely criticized for the fact that the descriptions of the users contained revealing details. In the end, the article was removed from the network with apologies.
Listen to the fourth season of the Exploded View podcast hosted by Juuso Pekkinen from Areena, the topic of which is technology and dating: