Hack4Equality will see tech-savvy experts including programmers, developers and designers working together to recognise issues in the LGBTQ community, before building apps and websites to tackle the problems raised.
Issues expected to be addressed include LGBTQ homelessness, access to sexual health services, PrEP and how the community is received worldwide.
Grindr CEO Joel Simkhai told NewNowNext: “Quite frankly, I don’t know what’s going to come out of this. But that’s the beauty of it.
“Data is a foundation of a lot of technology. It will be up to these teams to figure out what to do with it.
“They’ll have to analyse the data over time and see what’s interesting and try to figure out what problems to solve.”
The Hollywood-based company is teaming up with HackerNest for the hackathon, a Toronto-based non-profit organisation that helps to build local tech communities worldwide.
Attendees will get access to Grindr’s native data and open data through The White House Opportunity Project, so they can get valuable insights into user behaviour from the app’s data.
Despite this, Simkhai assured that Grindr users will be protected and that their anonymity and privacy will be respected.
And by the end of Hack4Equality, the hope is that there will be some new, innovative apps, websites and tech services that will help to deal with issues within the LGBTQ community.
Grindr CEO Simkhai said: “Our hope is that several teams will be able to run with these ideas and we’d help partner with us in developing these ideas.
“This will only be successful if we get great teams who are thinking about these issues and can help us get out and achieve it.”
To sign up for Hack4Equality please click here.