Plenty of Fish app unintentionally leaked users’ data including names and ZIP codes

Users of the dating app Plenty of Fish might have had their real-world identities compromised. This was revealed after an analyst found out that the app might have leaked personal data even for users who have set their profiles to private.

Plenty of Fish is a dating app with around 150 million users worldwide, Techradar reported. Unfortunately, the app has been leaking data such as the first names and postal ZIP codes of its users, according to the analyst who discovered the breach.

The data breach was discovered by mobile expert The App Analyst, Tech Crunch reported. The researcher noted that the leaked data is not “immediately visible to app users” because the data was scrambled. However, the researcher also pointed out that users’ information can be revealed by using freely available tools used for network traffic analysis.

It might even be possible to find out where a particular Plenty of Fish user lived. “In one case, the App Analyst found enough information to identify where a particular user lived,” The App Analyst told Tech Crunch.

“Initial analysis of the Plenty of Fish API showed responses contained generic logging and app data,” The App Analyst wrote. “Unfortunately the responses also contained user data which was potentially sensitive.”

While there are no reported cases at the moment of anyone trying to make use of this data leak, the vulnerability exposes the app’s users to potential bad actors. “With the API revealing both a users first name and the general location of their home it's not outside the realm of possibility that a malicious actor could leverage this data to locate the users of Plenty of Fish,” the researcher added.

The leakage is particularly glaring in light of recently reported cases of dating app-related attacks. “With the recent Grindr attacks dating platforms should be very careful with how they share their users location information as it could be used by criminals to harass or attack their users,” The App analysts cautioned.

Tech Crunch tried to get in touch with a spokesman for Plenty of Fish but did not immediately get a response. However, developers already addressed the issue by issuing a fix which rolled out early this month.