Crush (Friendzy): barely launched dating app causes scandal and worries parents 1

Crush (Friendzy): barely launched dating app causes scandal and worries parents

friendly love

There are scandals on social networks every day, we agree with this. But it continues over time, and it’s not hard to understand why. At this point, the debate has grown so much that many media outlets have covered the issue. You may have already heard of Crush, the new dating app for teens.

We can already question the ethics of such an application, whose targets are mostly minors. Although there are dating apps for almost all profiles today, this boundary still remains taboo for obvious security reasons. However, as always, this did not prevent adolescents from creating alternatives.

What is the new controversial app Crush?

In fact, for several years social networks (first Facebook, then more popular with teenagers, especially Snapchat) have hosted so-called “Wanted” groups. The principle of the latter is simple: in a given area, more or less large – you can create a “Wanted Paris” group as easily as a Wanted one dedicated to a particular university – users can discover who fell in love with them, that is, an attraction.

This is the principle on which Crush is based. The app, which launched a few days ago, is aimed at middle school and high school students and allows them to find matches at their school through a list of questions. Many issues have been raised with Crush since its launch, but one in particular has sparked the anger of Internet users: the app is open to users between the ages of 10 and 21.

So, in theory, nothing would stop a 21-year-old from chatting up a 10-year-old or even starting a game of seduction. For many, this is a new version of ados.net, a site known to be infested with pedophiles looking for gullible teenagers. Because actually Crush has another big problem: the complete lack of security.

Crush is a real danger for teenagers

The most obvious is also the most dramatic: It’s incredibly easy to create a fake account and pose as an ordinary college student. “I am 31 years old and had to choose an age other than my own to sign up. From what I can see there is no parental control. After entering this information, I went directly to the second step”, writes developer Julien Queffelec on X (Twitter).

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Suffice to say, the risks of exploitation are numerous. But it doesn’t end there. To find out who has a crush on them, users have to pay a subscription. The weekly cost to discover 2 of your fans is 3.99 euros. Q. Here again, we might question the ethics of asking a child to pay for a dating app and how they should go about it since most of them don’t have a debit card.

Other security threats also lurk within the app. In another thread, cybersecurity expert Mathis Hammel explains that he found a way to quickly hijack the profiles of all users of the app, including their personal data – of course, he did not implement this threat.

Mathis Hammel is also concerned about the use of data from adolescents registered in the application. When the general terms of use of the application were investigated, it was found that the companies collecting the data in question were not declared anywhere. In other words, these are probably fictitious companies created by Marc Allain, the developer of Crush and the sole owner and administrator of the collected personal data.

A debate that won’t fade away

So for several days Marc Allain defended himself against anyone who would listen with any intent to undermine his application. “My goal with Crush is to combat bullying in school by encouraging young people in the same institution to compliment each other through positive polls.” He makes sure nothing happens by explaining to Le Figaro. “There is no way for users to communicate directly. » Obviously, you have to pay.

Yesterday, the app rebranded itself as Friendzy, presumably to shed its brash image of romantic dating apps and instead focus on friendship. Previously, the name of the application was “Crush, discover your secret love”, but it was changed to “Crush, surveys between friends”. Likewise, the minimum age for profiling has also been increased to 13; This is also the age required by law to open an account on social networks. However, this is not enough to cause concern.

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When we become aware of an app that may violate Google Play policies, we review the app and take appropriate action, up to and including suspension of the app.», suggested a spokesman for Google France. As of now, the application continues to be published on Play Store and App Store.