Tinder to discontinue service for those under 18

Popular dating app Tinder has announced that it will discontinue its services to anyone who is not above 18 years of age. Launched in 2012, the app previously allowed anyone over 13 year of age to use it and the only verification process being the user’s Facebook account. So, users in the age group of 13-17 were only matched with other users who belonged to the same bracket.

Tinder has claimed that this change impacts less than 3 percent of their global user base and this change will take effect next week. In an official statement to TechCrunch, VP of Communications Rosette Pambakian said, “On a platform that has facilitated over 11 billion connections, we have the responsibility of constantly assessing our different user experiences. Consistent with this responsibility, we have decided to discontinue service for under 18 users.”

In addition to this measure, earlier this month, Tinder CEO Sean Rad had announced that they would be trying to improve the experience for users from the transgender community. “There’s a transgender community on Tinder and we haven’t done enough to give them a good experience,” Rad said on Thursday at Recode’s Code Conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, reports  CNET.  Many transgenders would have difficulty using Tinder as their accounts would be flagged by other people who thought they were fake.