"Unfortunately, consumers don't have a lot of options for evaluating the security of dating services, according to Jonathan Mayer, a computer scientist and lawyer affiliated with Stanford's Center for Internet and Society. And the explosion of services in the market means that start-ups may not be putting users' privacy first.
"Young apps often don't prioritize security and privacy," he said. "Growth is everything in the start-up space -- and that can come at users' expense."
Mayer is also concerned about the trend of using logins for other social networks in dating apps. Instead of having users pull out a complete profile, they ask them to connect with their Facebook or LinkedIn pages -- pulling pictures or text to prepopulate their account. But that could mean even bigger problems if a breach occurs, Mayer said. "That means a compromise of those services won't just give information about things you deliberately shared with the dating site, but could expose otherwise private information associated with your primary social media accounts.""