Cybercrimeology

A Treacherous Land: Cyberstalking and Harassment on Dating Apps

Episode Summary

How can the features that make dating apps convenient also create opportunities for harassment? Jennifer Ayerza from George Mason University joins us to discuss how people use dating apps, what they disclose on their profiles and how these choices can affect their experiences. We also discuss what users, platform operators, schools and governments can do to make online dating safer.

Episode Notes

Notes:

• Ms. Ayerza studied criminology, forensic behavioural sciences and psychology. Her early research examined eyewitness memory and the re-entry of exonerees before she became interested in cybercrime and cyberstalking.
• She was drawn to cybercrime because it is not limited to hacking, malware and phishing. Technology is part of everyday life through social media, email, dating apps and other commonly used services.
• Dating apps allow users to create profiles, specify the people and relationships in which they are interested and indicate interest in other users. When two users express an interest in one another, they can normally begin communicating through the app.
• Some dating apps are intended for broad audiences, while others serve particular lifestyles, interests or sexual orientations. Profiles are often presented as individual photographs or grids of photographs from which users make selections.
• Ms. Ayerza explains that dating apps are designed to make dating convenient and can feel like games. The superficial and rapid nature of matching can encourage users to make decisions based primarily on photographs.
• Harassment can arise when users send repeated messages in an effort to gain someone’s attention. Some people may not recognize these repeated or unwanted communications as harassment.
• Users may also deliberately match with someone because they disagree with something in that person’s profile and want an opportunity to criticize or harass them.
• Ms. Ayerza conducted an online survey of adult dating app users living in the United States. The study examined the information people included in their profiles, the photographs they shared and characteristics of the applications they used.
• The study considered whether users disclosed their relationship preferences, sexual orientation, workplace or occupation. It also examined whether they used their full name or an alternative name and whether their photographs included friends or family.
• Verification on dating apps can be a relatively superficial process in which a live photograph is compared with the photographs on a profile. Premium features may also allow users to change the location in which their profiles appear.
• Users often adopt their own protective measures, such as using pseudonyms or withholding photographs of their faces. However, designing effective technical safeguards is difficult because repeated messages can be part of both ordinary conversations and harassment.
• Most dating app users do not experience harassment, but Ms. Ayerza says that around a quarter of the users in the study experienced these forms of harm.
• The study did not compare victimisation across individual dating apps. Ms. Ayerza suggests that larger platforms may have more resources and face greater public pressure to introduce safeguards, while smaller platforms may have fewer resources.
• Sharing relationship or sexual orientation preferences was not found to increase risk. Ms. Ayerza suggests that these preferences help platforms present users with people who have similar interests without necessarily revealing where someone can be found.
• Including information about where a person works or studies increased risk. Photographs featuring friends or family also had an influence because they can reveal social connections and additional information about the user.
• Uploading photographs of one’s face was not found to increase risk, possibly because facial photographs are a normal and often required part of using dating apps.
• Matching with someone under the age of 18 increased risk. Ms. Ayerza connects this finding to the limited measures used by dating apps to confirm that users are old enough to participate.
• One of the most surprising findings was that using a pseudonym or nickname increased risk. Ms. Ayerza discusses the possibility that an alternative name creates a false sense of security and encourages people to disclose more information.
• Ms. Ayerza advises users to think carefully about what they disclose. Preferences may be appropriate to share, while details about occupations, workplaces, friends and family may be better withheld until someone is known more closely.
• She emphasizes that responsibility should not be placed entirely on victims. People should understand that harassment is unacceptable and platform operators should do more to prevent and respond to harmful behaviour.
• Possible platform interventions include better reporting mechanisms and educational or training modules that users complete before creating a profile.
• Schools could help prepare young people to communicate appropriately on dating apps once they are old enough to use them. Ms. Ayerza also argues that governments should treat conduct on dating apps more seriously because every profile represents a real person.
• Future researchers need measures that reflect the activities people actually perform on dating apps. Greater consistency would also make it easier to compare findings across studies.
• Ms. Ayerza plans to examine offending as well as victimisation. Her future research will consider unwanted sexual messages, sexual violence and the experience of multiple forms of harm on dating apps.

About our guest:

Jennifer M. Ayerza, M.A.

https://cls.gmu.edu/people/jayerza

https://cebcp.org/team/jennifer-ayerza/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennifer-ayerza-38353a233

Papers or resources mentioned in this episode:

Ayerza, J. M., Lee, J. R., O’Malley, R. L., & Lee, C. S. (2026). Cyberstalking and online dating: Examining cyberstalking victimization among dating app users. Asian Journal of Criminology, 21, Article 5.

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11417-025-09480-2