Washington — Two bipartisan U.S. senators this week demanded detailed information from Match Group — the parent company of Tinder, Hinge and OkCupid — about the company’s efforts to detect and prevent romance scams, saying lawmakers are concerned the platforms’ design and algorithms may be enabling fraud.
Sens. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) sent a formal letter to Match CEO Spencer Rascoff asking for documents and data that lay out the company’s policies, detection practices and the scale of fraudulent activity on its apps. The senators gave Match until Oct. 15 to produce records dating back to Jan. 1, 2022, including statistics on suspected scam accounts, removal timelines, and analyses related to algorithmic recommendations.
“Romance scams, in which fraudsters form relationships to induce money or gifts from victims, have become a leading form of financial fraud,” the letter noted, citing government data on rising consumer losses. Lawmakers said they were particularly worried that product design choices can create a false sense of trust that scammers exploit.
Match Group pushed back in public statements, saying protecting users is “essential to our business” and pointing to recent investments in fraud detection, new safety features and partnerships with law enforcement and civil-society groups. Company spokespeople have highlighted ongoing efforts such as account-screening tools and optional background-check features rolled out across parts of the portfolio.
The senators’ request digs into specific operational questions: how quickly the company removes suspected scam accounts, what proportion of new or active accounts are flagged as fraudulent, whether internal audits have found algorithmic patterns that amplify scammers, and how much Match spends on safety and enforcement. Observers said the answers could shape whether Congress pursues tougher regulatory scrutiny of dating apps.
Romance scams have become a substantial enforcement and consumer-protection issue: federal agencies and industry reports show growing financial losses to victims in recent years, a trend that investigators attribute to increasingly sophisticated fraud tactics carried out across social platforms and dating services. Lawmakers said they want to understand whether platforms are doing enough — and whether design choices unintentionally help scammers gain traction.
What happens next
Match has until the mid-October deadline to produce the requested records. If senators remain unsatisfied, the inquiry could lead to hearings, referrals to relevant oversight committees, or legislative proposals aimed at tightening platform responsibilities on consumer fraud. For now, the inquiry adds to mounting bipartisan pressure on big tech companies to demonstrate how they protect users from harms that originate on their services.
