France’s top dating apps have signed a government charter to help tackle homophobic ambushes, after one case was recorded every four days in 2024, the ministry in charge of fighting discrimination said on Wednesday. The agreement sets out measures to improve reporting, data sharing and user safety.
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Dating apps Tinder, Grindr, Bumble and Happn signed the charter on Monday alongside the non-profit groups SOS Homophobie, Stop Homophobie, Le Refuge and Flag!, Aurore Bergé, the junior minister for fighting discrimination, said in a statement.
The “charter for the prevention of violence and the safety of LGBT+ people” sets out “concrete commitments around three priorities: prevent, report and protect”, the ministry said.
Victims are lured by fake profiles, tricked into meetings and then attacked because of their sexual orientation.
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Safer tools, shared data
The platforms have promised to improve their tools for reporting threats or ambushes.
They will also keep data so it can be passed to law enforcement, including after profiles are deleted, and will work more closely with authorities to “identify and prosecute perpetrators”, the ministry said.
The charter also commits the platforms to promoting the use of verified profiles.
The ministry described the deal as “an unprecedented collective commitment between public authorities, digital platforms, associations and law enforcement”.
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Organised violence
“These LGBT-phobic ambushes are organised violence targeting people simply because they are, or are assumed to be, LGBT+,” Bergé said in the statement.
“Tools designed to create meetings and connections can no longer be diverted to set traps and organise hate.”
She said France was becoming “the first country in the world to establish this level of cooperation” with the platforms on the issue.
In an interview with Têtu, a French LGBT+ magazine, Bergé said the attacks were premeditated. “These ambushes are not ordinary assaults,” she said, adding the government had begun work with the platforms to strengthen prevention and reporting.
“The digital environment makes it easier to act,” Bergé told Têtu. “Behind a screen, perpetrators think they can escape justice. That is false.”
She also said coordination between the apps and law enforcement would be simplified, bans strengthened to stop excluded users signing up again, and cooperation between platforms improved.
