Tinder this week revealed it has bolstered security to keep users' activities safe from prying eyes.
The move comes after security researchers with Checkmarx in January revealed that the app failed to use HTTPS encryption when fetching images. That lack of encryption meant your Tinder activity could have been exposed over a local Wi-Fi network, revealing Tinder likes and matches in real time.
Following those revelations, Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, sent a letter to Tinder parent company Match Group urging the company to "immediately secure" its app. Now, Tinder has responded.
So, um, this is pretty weird. Apparently Senator Wyden just got Tinder to properly encrypt your swipe data, so you can all get it on in private. pic.twitter.com/BniAVUi77Q — Matthew Green (@matthew_d_green) June 29, 2018
In a Wednesday letter to Wyden, Match Group General Counsel Jared Sine wrote that "images transmitted between the Tinder app and servers are now fully encrypted." That change went into effect on Feb. 6, 2018. He added that "images on the Web version of Tinder were already encrypted."
Tinder also recently rolled out a change that should prevent snoops from being able to differentiate left and right swipes.
"I am happy to report that swipe data has been padded such that all actions are now the same size (effective June 19, 2018)," Sine wrote.
The dating app previously sent 278 bytes of encrypted information to the company's image server for a left swipe and 374 bytes for a more favorable right swipe.
"Protecting the private data of our users is a top priority," Sine wrote. "We take the security and privacy of our users seriously and employ a network of tools and systems to protect the integrity of our platform, including encryption."