Tinder adds panic button and photo verification to keep you safe during dates

If you have ever felt unsafe during a Tinder date, the popular dating app has announced a feature to help you out. Tinder's parent company Match Group announced the dating app will get a panic button that's operated by Noonlight, a safety app that track's people's location and sends the data to emergency services when an alarm is raised.

Beginning January 28, the Tinder app will have a panic button which when activated during a bad date, will alert the local police about your location. The user has to opt in to Noonlight's services, and you can add a badge certifying the same in your profile.

In case you are concerned about Tinder tracking your location, the company assured that the location data will be shared with Noonlight and Tinder will not be a party to it. Users will also have the option to turn location sharing or or off. So when you go on a date, you can turn it on, and after the date has ended, you can turn it back off.

Apart from the panic button, Tinder also rolled out a global photo verification program to verify users using the platform to find matches. The feature will allow Tinder to detect inappropriate messaging and get senders reported.

Match Group which owns Tinder, Plenty of Fish, Match, OkCupid and Hinge will integrate the Noonlight Panic Button feature and the photo verification feature to its other offerings as well, later this year.

The new features should help in making the online dating platform safer to use. Previously, an investigation by Buzzfeed, Columbia School of Journalism and ProPublica had revealed Match Group exposed users to registered sex offenders on most of its apps. And in about 157 cases, women who were victims of sexual assualt after meeting dates from dating apps,the dates were from the apps belonging to the Match Group.