Online Dating Safety Tips

CHICAGO TRIBUNE's RED EYE -- Oct 24 -- Here's how to stay safe when making your cyber love match:
- For first meetings, always meet in a public, populated place and don't end up at your or your date's home. Don't have your date pick you up at your home, either.
- Tell a friend or family member whom you're meeting, where you're going and when you expect to return. Bring your cell phone with you.
- Don't share your real identity or private contact information until you're comfortable with the person. Set up a third-party e-mail address you use exclusively for dating, and don't reveal your home address until you've been on a couple of dates.
- Until you've known the person for a while, don't get too drunk or leave your drink or personal belongings unattended.
SOURCE: Match.com Safety tips and Online personals industry analyst Mark Brooks

Soon, you will be able to get an anonymous phone number—a Vumber—so that you can talk to new dates without them knowing your real phone number. Calls to your Vumber will ring to whatever cell or landline you choose, but the caller will only know your Vumber. You also can make outgoing calls from the Vumber so your real phone number won't appear on someone else's Caller ID. The Web site www.vumber.com will be live in November, and the service is slated for release at the Internet Dating Convention in January.

Mark Brooks: Vumber is my client. I'm guiding their strategy, business development efforts and PR. The service will be simple, inexpensive, and designed for singles (and online personals sites).

Comments

[CHG]

Telling women not to "share their real identity" or by extrapolation, demand it from the men they meet, is one very serious mistake. As a victim of a highly-publicized date rape, I can tell you that one of the ways the serial rapist who attacked me operated was by using fake names. He even gave me a fake name on the date --- it wasn't until after the attack, when I kicked the glove box of his vehicle open --- that I found his DMV registration with his real name on it. Many women came forward and testified to all the different names he had given them.

Of course we all want privacy. But privacy and secrecy are not the same thing, and secrecy aids those who are out to do harm. "Vumbers" may be a good idea; but insisting on anonymity is NOT. If a person really is sincere and honest and wants to date you, INSIST on knowing her/his REAL first and last name, and take the time to verify it. Just knowing a fake name won't help you (or the emergency contact you left it with, or the police)to find you or a criminal, and may in fact be held against you in a trial ("What? You mean to say you dated a person and weren't even sure of his real name?") Take it from someone who spent 3 agonizing days on the witness stand. Honest people have nothing to hide. If someone is adamant about not revealing their real name and home town, they do have something to hide. But don't wait around to find out what it is. And being "in a public place" won't help you in this situation, either. I was raped in broad daylight on a Saturday afternoon at a marina.

CG, Rhode Island

[Mark Brooks]

The online dating industry seeks to lower the chances of such attacks. How should we proceed? What safeguards would you like to see the online personals industry put in place? Thanks CG.

Mark Brooks
Editor, Online Personals Watch

[Meet Your Asian Soulmate]

I thought I have everything I need to know about dating, relationship etc. not until I stumble upon your website. Your articles are worth reading.

Keep up the great work. Kudos!

[Ben T]

My heart goes out to you, CG, after reading your reply to this article. The thing is, if someone really wants to hide something, they are going to hide it, especially with all the tools available for identity protection these days.

What I always recommended was that people meet first for coffee, or lunch, at a public place like Starbucks. That way - its in the middle of the day, you have limited time, there is no thought about leaving the original place and going back to someone's house, etc.