This article was published on April 18, 2011

Match.com Institutes Screening for Sex Offenders


Match.com Institutes Screening for Sex Offenders

The Associated Press reports that Match.com will begin checking it’s members against the national sex offenders registry.

This is in response to a lawsuit brought on by a woman who was sexually assaulted following a date arranged on Match.com late last week.

The woman, who is publicly identified as Jane Doe, was suing the dating site to get Match.com to change its policies on screening new members for past sexual crimes. Previous to the suit being brought, Match.com had no screening procedure in place.

Match.com president Mandy Ginsberg said that the company had been historically unwilling to implement such screening procedures, stating its “historical unreliability”. The recent suit caused them to revisit the idea however, and Match.com’s advisors have convinced them that enough improvements have been made to the registry to make the results accurate enough to integrate into a screening procedure.

The policy is set to take effect sometime in the next 60 to 90 days, reports Cnet, but mentions that these type of checks can still be flawed and that members should read and follow the safety tips on their site.

There is no word on whether the screenings would include all currently registered members or just new applicants.

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