Dating app Tea confirms data breach, 72,000 user images exposed

Tea, a dating app that allows women to anonymously review and comment on their experiences with men, has confirmed a major data breach in which hackers accessed tens of thousands of user images.

A spokesperson for Tea told Reuters on July 26 that the platform had experienced "unauthorized access to our systems," resulting in the exposure of approximately 72,000 images. These include around 13,000 selfies and photo IDs submitted for account verification, as well as 59,000 images from posts, comments, and direct messages.

“We have engaged third-party cybersecurity experts and are working around the clock to secure our systems,” the company said in a statement. The platform added that no email addresses or phone numbers were compromised and clarified that only users who signed up before February 2024 were affected by the breach.

The incident was first reported by 404 Media early on July 25.

Tea has grown rapidly in popularity in recent months. The app, whose motto is “women should never have to compromise their safety while dating,” enables verified female users to share Yelp-style reviews of men. According to a recent post on the app’s Instagram page, more than two million users had requested access to the platform in recent days.

Signing up for Tea requires users to take selfies, which the app says are reviewed as part of its verification process.

By Sabina Mammadli