The safe apps seem the only way to have safe sex these days!

Online scams of various types are nothing new, but the trends that have been recorded in the last few years are more than worrying.

In the United States, since 2017, when the damage from fraud committed through social networks was estimated at 42 million dollars, this figure reached almost 800 million US dollars in 2021. To be more precise, regarding the fraud on social networks during 2021, according to the data of the Federal Trade Commission, over 95 thousand people reported the fraud and the damage exceeded 770 million dollars.

And what is astonishing is that those losses account for about 25% of all reported losses to fraud in 2021, so we can freely say with certainty that the damage in 2021 actually exceeded 3 billion US dollars, especially if we take into account that the largest number of frauds is not officially reported to the state authorities. It is necessary to mention here once again that these are figures concerning frauds committed exclusively through social networks.

The "lovemakers" are grateful to the "lawmakers"!

Under U.S. law, as of May 2021, all dating platforms are required to apply rules and solutions that will prevent fraud or any form of abuse. In 2019, thanks to the Columbia School of Journalism in New York City and the ProPublica website, it was revealed that the Match Group, which has dozens of dating apps under its umbrella, monitors sexual offenses only on paid apps, while free ones such as Tinder or OkCupid were open space for the unhindered action of sexual predators and bullies. The legislatures of the United States of America reacted and passed special legal provisions that put this sphere in order as much as possible.

According to FTC (The Federal Trade Commission), more than a third of people who said they lost money to an online romance scam in 2021 said it began on Facebook or Instagram.

In 2021, 45% of reports of money lost to social media scams were online shopping frauds, and most of them also happened on Facebook and Instagram.

The most reported and realized scams are these "online shopping" scams, but investment scams and scams based on romantic relationships are the ones that are most often tried by scammers.

Recently, cryptocurrency scams have become especially popular.

Due to new law regulations brought by US lawmakers in May 2021, Tinder has introduced a machine learning solution to detect abusive messages and language, giving the option to the writer to reconsider the message before sending it. One of the online dating leaders, Bumble, also has integrated an AI solution to blur specific images which require user consent to view them.

The recent research of Bumpy Intelligence Unit, the department of the Bumpy App company, showed that the Bumpy App is the social networking app with the biggest percentage of verified users compared to similar apps.

Bumpy has a vast 87% active verified users worldwide, successfully confirming the proclaimed mission of creating “the safest social networking app for making new friends around the world”.

According to the Sample Size Calculation research method, which Bumpy Intelligence Unit used in this research, the number of Bumpy App active verified users is 8x bigger than Yubo’s number of verified users and 7x bigger than Tinder’s. The leading competitor Ablo doesn’t have verification at all.

The Sample Size Calculation research method is known for having the possibility of error in the final research result that does not exceed 5%.

The Bumpy App team applied this popular research method with the goal of getting an approximate view of how many users are verified in Yubo or Tinder. The team swiped a sample size of 350 profiles in three cities: New York City, London, and Hong Kong. The percentage of verified Tinder users is ~13% and the percentage of verified Yubo users is ~11%.

How Bumpy is doing it?

Bumpy (iOS) has a unique, fast, and simple interface with Map & Cards to meet new people around the world. All users on Map are verified because only verified users can show themselves on Map. With Cards, users can swipe users’ profiles with a high percentage being real and verified.

By chatting in the app, Bumpy limits unverified users by limited characters per day, sending unusual messages (for example, messages with an email address or a social media link), photos, or making video calls. To chat with unverified users safely and motivate users to pass verification. Also, Bumpy can recognize scams, spam, or harassment messages from verified users, for example, asking about money or investments in crypto coins. It makes chatting in the app with trust and honesty. Each user’s verification request pass customer support via Bumpy CRM. Suppose that users passed the verification process successfully and got a verification badge but changed avatars. In that case, Bumpy will remove the verification badge from them and send their new avatars to customer support for pending review. It allows close a gap for fakes that are significantly popular in social networking and dating industries.

If we believe the research that says that on average every fourth or fifth marriage is the result of connecting through online dating platforms, we can say partly jokingly, but partly extremely seriously that we are approaching an era in which safe application will be the only way to have safe sex. Or, at the very least, we can be sure that safe apps are an imperative of modern communication, given the growing number and growing variety of online scams and online violence.

BIU (Bumpy Intelligence Unit)