YONHAP NEWS - Techlabs, operator of the South Korean dating app Amanda, was fined 220M won ($166K) for creating fake profiles using real users' photos without consent. The company matched these fake accounts with real users for over a year, violating privacy rights.
4 posts categorized "Amanda"
South Korean Dating App Operator Fined for Creating Fake Profiles
| |
Exclusive Dating Apps in South Korea
KOREA HERALD - Mar 23 - In order to join dating app Amanda, users need to receive an average score of three or higher out of a possible five points from 20 members of the app. GoldSpoon, which takes its name from the term used in Korea to refer to people from wealthy families, only allows rich men to join the app. They must own an imported car, having a house in the three most expensive districts in Seoul, earning ~70M won ($56K) or having a highly paying professional job. Women applicants must have a professional job or an appearance that passes the test by the members in the app. The acceptable age range is 20 to 40 for both men and women. Educational background is another factor restricting those who can join certain dating apps. SKY People and Diamatch requires applicants to the app to verify having attended or graduated prestigious universities or to be working for a major company.
by Lim Jang-won
See full article at Korea Herald
| |
Korean Dating App Amanda Claims 5M Users
THE INVESTOR - Jan 10 - Amanda is a dating app that has shot to the top of the industry charts over the past few years. In the Q2 of 2018, Amanda ranked first in terms of sales in the local dating app market, with ~5M users. This year, the industry is expected to hit 500B won ($446M) in South Korea. One way of quality control at Amanda is through the so-called "member-screening system." People who want to join must be judged by existing members and obtain a score of 3.0 or higher. "Koreans don't like meeting strangers online, especially women, who like to meet people who've already been approved by their friends or peers," explained Shin Sang-hoon, co-founder and CEO of NextMatch, the operator of Amanda.
| |
Tinder Not Catching Fire In South Korea
KOREA EXPOSÉ - Feb 19 - The 2018 Winter Olympics are now under way. So it's not surprising that multiple media have reported a 348% increase in usage of Tinder in the area since the games began in early February. Tinder made its debut in South Korea in 2015 but despite its international popularity, the dating app is still largely unknown in a country notorious as the graveyard of many foreign-born startups and companies including Uber and Google. The country's online dating industry is valued at 70B won ($66M), according to a 2017 study by An Hyo-Jin and Kim Seung-in of Hongik University. Shin Sang-hoon is CEO of Nextmatch, the company that owns the most popular South Korean dating app Amanda. He told Korea Exposé that Amanda had ~4M users in South Korea. Given that there were ~8.54M bachelors (aged between 20 and 39) in the country in 2016, it can be inferred that one out of two South Korean bachelors has used or is using dating apps. Tinder has successfully established itself in Hong Kong and Singapore (but not in China because the app insists that users log in via Facebook, which is blocked in the people's republic).
| |