Badoo Adds New Selfie Photo Verification Feature

In an effort to weed out fake profiles, online dating giant Badoo has just introduced a brand new photo verification feature.

The company said the new tool was designed to make women feel safer when online dating, by ensuring there are only “real people and real photos” on the platform.

If its users want to get a photo verified, they must take a selfie where they are doing a specific pose that has been given to them by Badoo.

They then send this photo to the company, and one of Badoo’s 5,000 moderators check to make sure the user has followed the “pose” directions, then approves the image.

And with the addition of the new feature, users of the dating platform can now opt to only chat with verified users.

Speaking about the new product update, Badoo President Alexandra Chong said:

“The average woman receives 4 times more attention online than men, and it can be tough for busy women to filter their suitors efficiently.

“The launch of Badoo’s Photo Verification feature aims to not only help women cut through the fog, but also help them feel safer knowing that potential suitors have been verified.”

 

 

Chong said this new feature was specifically built to stop catfishing, which she called “a legitimate problem”.

She said Badoo hopes to make it “even safer to meet someone online than in a bar.”

Earlier this week, it was revealed that Badoo owns 79% of popular mobile dating startup Bumble.

The partnership between the two companies had always been known, but the extent of Badoo & founder Andrey Andreev’s stake in the startup was not, the company now revealed to have a huge majority share in the mobile dating app.

In the company’s official filed documents, Whitney Wolfe, Bumble’s founder & CEO was also revealed to own 20% of the business.

This news comes after a busy year for Badoo, the company stepping out the shadows with an increased PR push, which has coincided with the appointment of Lulu founder Alexandra Chong as President.

Chong joined the company after the male-rating app she founded, Lulu, was acquired by Badoo and transformed into a straightforward dating app, merging with Badoo’s 300m users.

Earlier this month, Badoo also revealed it was the first dating app to hit 100m downloads on Android.

Calling itself the fastest-growing dating platform in the world, Badoo joins companies like Snapchat, Spotify, Twitter and WhatsApp in reaching the milestone.

Find out more about the Lulu acquisition here.