Grindr has agreed to pay £26 million to settle a UK lawsuit brought by thousands of users who accused the dating platform of improperly sharing highly sensitive personal information, including HIV status in some cases, with third parties.
The legal dispute dates back to April 2024, when law firm Austen Hays filed proceedings in the High Court of England and Wales. The case concerned Grindr’s data practices before early 2020 and eventually grew to represent approximately 12,000 people.
Claimants alleged that information provided through the app was shared with advertising and analytics companies without adequate consent. The data at issue included details concerning users’ sexual orientation, ethnicity and, for some individuals, HIV status and testing information.
Grindr allows users to voluntarily provide information about their HIV status and the date of their most recent test. Concerns surrounding the handling of this information had emerged years before the UK lawsuit. In 2018, Grindr announced that it would stop sharing HIV status information with third-party companies after researchers identified data transfers involving analytics providers Apptimize and Localytics.
The £26 million agreement resolves the UK group action without a finding that Grindr violated the law. The company continues to dispute the allegations and has not admitted liability.
According to Grindr’s regulatory filing, the settlement will be paid in two installments. The first £13 million payment is due by December 31st, 2026, with another £13 million scheduled by March 31st, 2027.
If the entire amount were divided equally among 12,000 claimants, it would represent approximately £2,167 per person, although actual individual payments may differ depending on how the settlement is distributed.
Grindr emphasizes that the allegations concern practices from before 2020, when the company was owned and controlled by Chinese gaming company Beijing Kunlun Tech. It was sold to new owners in 2020 and later became publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange.
The company says it has substantially changed its privacy program since the period covered by the lawsuit, focusing more heavily on transparency, user control and responsible handling of information.
The UK case is not Grindr’s first regulatory dispute concerning personal data. Norway’s privacy regulator previously fined the company over violations involving the sharing of user information for advertising purposes, a decision that Grindr unsuccessfully appealed.
Although the £26 million agreement closes the UK group action, the settlement itself contains no admission of wrongdoing or judicial finding of liability against Grindr.