Users wary of finding love online with over 6% of all identity fraud in 2025 taking place on dating apps
Sumsub has joined the Online Dating and Discovery Association (ODDA) as an Associate Partner. As ODDA's newest Associate Partner, Sumsub will act as a strategic advisor and participate in a two-part webinar series on fraud prevention and deepfake trends for the association's member network.
The partnership brings Sumsub's fraud prevention and identity verification capabilities directly to ODDA's member network. This is a much-needed focus for the industry: the dating sector recorded an identity fraud rate of 6.3% in 2025, joint highest of any industry tracked in Sumsub's Identity Fraud Report 2025-2026, alongside online media.
AI fraudsters running rampant on dating apps
Romance scams cost UK victims more than £100m last year. Fraudsters are turning to powerful AI image and video tools to create convincing deepfakes and synthetic personas. Bad actors can now quickly build trust with victims at scale with sophisticated, multi-layered identity fraud, before moving interactions off-platform and making financial requests.
Sumsub's survey of 2,000 UK dating app users, conducted via CensusWide, found 84% believe the presence of deepfake content on dating platforms had made it harder to trust people they meet online. Nearly two in three users (61%) have been deceived by a fake profile, or knew a family member or friend who had.
A step forward for safer online dating
“Dating platforms face some of the most sophisticated fraud challenges of any sector, and this will worsen as AI tools become more accessible and capable,” said Kat Cloud, Head of Government Relations at Sumsub. “Infrastructure has to keep pace with deepfakes and realistic fraudulent content. We’re proud to work alongside ODDA’s leadership and members to help raise standards across the sector at this crucial time and help protect the public.”
