In June, a woman in Denver tried to jump out of a moving car that was being driven by a man she’d met on a dating app. They were on their way to coffee when “an argument broke out,” according to Denver police records. The man drove off with the woman’s belongings in the car.
Two months earlier, a man who had “intimate relations” with another man he met on the dating app Grindr discovered his date had absconded with the victim’s MacBook Pro and iPad while he was in the restroom, Denver police records show.
Apps such as Tinder, Bumble, Grindr and Hinge have been connecting eligible smartphone users for years, transforming the dating landscape to one in which at least one in five 18- to 24-year-olds reported using such apps, according to 2016 Pew Research data. Twelve percent of 55- to 64-year-olds use online or mobile dating apps too.
But they’re also used by predators and criminals looking for a mark.
“This sort of dating technology did not exist years ago, and it’s now a mainstream way of dating,” said Aurora police Sgt. Bill Hummel. “I don’t think anybody in this age will refute that. Dating has changed and the dating scene has changed, so our practices in being safe and taking care of ourselves should change too.”
Safe words and background checks join minty gum and cologne in the arsenal of tools Coloradans wield when it comes to first dates prompted by the swipe of an app.
While some dating app users such as 43-year-old Jake Sherlock of Fort Collins impart sweet stories — his began with a Bumble date that resulted in marriage 11 months later — other users didn’t get a fairy-tale ending.
In 2018, Denver police counted 53 crimes in which the victim and suspect met on a dating app. Rape accounted for almost 34 percent of those crimes; about 3 percent of all rapes Denver police responded to last year stemmed from a dating-app encounter, according to spokesman Sonny Jackson. Harassment and fraud by telephone made up about 7 percent of the app-related crimes. Theft and extortion accounted for more than 5 percent, according to Denver police data.
Mary Dulacki, the Denver Department of Public Safety’s records administrator, said there could be additional cases of dating apps contributing to crimes that weren’t captured in the available Denver police data.
Laura Webb, 34, of Wheat Ridge, has gone through the familiar tango of downloading and deleting dating apps.
“Maybe I watch too much ‘Dateline,’ but I sort of think that people don’t have the purest intentions, and I just assume that I will probably end up a headline instead of happily married,” Webb said. “I don’t like the idea of meeting a complete stranger without people around that you know. I’m sure I’m going to end up in the trunk of someone’s car.”
Nicci Field, 28, created a safe word she can text her friends if a Bumble or Hinge date in Colorado Springs starts making her feel unsafe.
“I’ve had a couple of creepers in my day,” Field said. “I always make sure to meet in public because I’m not trying to meet a serial killer.”
Even Sherlock, whose Bumble date turned into happily ever after, admitted his now-wife had a friend phone her as “an escape call” on their first date in case she needed to get out of the situation.
“I made a good enough first impression that she told me about it on the spot,” Sherlock said. “Pretty sure our happy ending is rare.”
Julie Spira, a Los Angeles-based cyberdating expert who has been helping singles find love online for 25 years, would disagree.
Spira believes dating apps are a safe way to connect as long as people follow a few precautions.
- Keep early communications strictly within the app. This way, if something does go wrong, the app is better able to corroborate what happened and trace communications, and your personal phone number isn’t compromised if someone’s intentions are hazardous.
- Do some digging. If you’re not the more than 50 percent of people who check out their date on Facebook, LinkedIn and whatever other social media profiles they can find before heading out for their rendezvous, Spira said you should join the majority. Even do a reverse image search online to make sure your date didn’t steal their photos from someone else online. Try to verify they’re who they say they are and that they just seem, you know, normal.
- Don’t go incognito. Choose a public meeting spot and let friends know who you’re meeting and where you’re going. Meet at the location and don’t get into the car with a stranger on the first date, Spira said.
“I think you have the opportunity to meet so many more people by using dating apps,” Spira said. “You might have a better experience than meeting someone at a bar after too many drinks, and you tend to ask a lot more questions over dating apps.”
Elizabeth Williamsberg, 37, met her husband on dating website OKCupid at the end of 2013. The Louisville woman said that although she always let a friend know when and who she was going out with while online dating, she felt secure.
“I felt no less safe on my online dates as I did going to bars or speed-dating nights or blind dates,” Williamsberg said. “In fact, I felt slightly safer since everything was planned out prior and I had info that could help if I went MIA.”
Despite the crimes Denver police responded to that were tied to online dating, Jackson said police departments don’t blame the apps.
“It’s the people that are the people,” Jackson said. “Take the necessary precautions no matter how you meet someone.”
