Grindr announces support for app store age-verification bill

Grindr is supporting a US app store age-verification bill. 

On Tuesday (2 December), the dating app, which recently revealed its annual Grindr Unwrapped data, published a blog post confirming its support for Republican representative John James’ App Store Accountability Act. 

The bill, introduced to Congress by James of Michigan and Republican representative Mike Lee of Utah is expected to be debated during a House committee meeting. 

‘Keeping minors off our platform is a top priority’

Grindr’s head of Global Government Affairs, Joe Hack, wrote in the post: “Grindr is only for adults aged 18 and over. Keeping minors off our platform is a top priority. We invest significant resources including an age gate, device-level bans, human moderation, proprietary AI tools, and partnerships with child-safety organizations to prevent and remove underage users.”

It has so far received support from companies such as Meta, Snap and X and aims to “creates a single, secure age-verification process at the app-store level and allows developers to receive a verified age signal”. 

Hack added: “This approach, supported by nearly 90% of parents, is safer and more consistent than requiring users to verify their age separately across many apps. By contrast, the UK and EU are moving toward fragmented rules that force adults to share sensitive personal information with thousands of apps, creating unnecessary privacy and safety risks.” 

He concluded that Grindr “urge Congress to advance this critical legislation”. 

Some critics have accused other bills of being created to censor LGBTQ+ content. Earlier this year, the UK implemented age-verification through its UK Online Safety Act, which forces websites that host adult content, such as Grindr, to implement age verification checks. 

Those who don’t abide by the act could face hefty fines if they fail to implement a form of ID-check, such as facial recognition, credit or debit card checks, or other forms of ID.

Critics of the bill say that its provisions will make the UK a “much more censored, locked-down” country, accusing the UK government of undermining the “freedom of all internet users”.

A petition to repeal the act argued that “the scope of the Online Safety Act is far broader and restrictive than is necessary in a free society”. 

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