Amidst the ongoing 2024 Paris Olympics, a ban has been imposed on gay dating app Grindr within the Olympic village.
The reason cited are the unspecified risks posed to athletes’ privacy and safety. In a purview of Olympic village, users who are trying to access grinder’s explore function continue to see ‘no profile available’ message.
In addition, the geolocation of the app was also found non-functional in area containing over 14,000 athletes. Thus, establishing a barrier in a village.
Taking to its blog, Grinder stated that LGBTQ+ athletes can also establish a connection without unheeded attention or prying eyes.
In addition, Grinder also reveals that usage of Grinder App can put those athletes at risk. Especially, if an athlete hasn’t declared or comes from a country, where being LGBTQ+ is illegal or dangerous.
Hence, the company is replicating and expanding measures that came into effect during 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.
Moreover, the app has also decided to disconnect location-based features in Olympic villages and in those places, where athletes come for training and other activities. According to Grinder, this a way of ensuring that athletes establish connection with each other organically without worrying about unheeded attention.
Meanwhile Paris 2024 organizing committee has also confirmed to press that even though dating apps can be usually used in the village, but for some ‘geolocation has been disabled by app publisher.
This precaution maintains implementation during prior Olympics to provide protection to LGBTQ+ athletes from potential harassment and reveal.
