Grindr has agreed to pay approximately $35 million to settle a lawsuit brought by thousands of users who accused the LGBTQ+ dating app of improperly sharing highly sensitive personal information, including some users’ HIV status, with third parties.
The case involves users in the United Kingdom, but the settlement was disclosed through a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The lawsuit was originally filed in 2024 in the High Court of England and Wales and eventually grew to include more than 11,000 claimants.
According to the claims, Grindr shared sensitive information with outside companies without adequate consent. The information allegedly included users’ HIV status, dates of their most recent HIV tests, ethnicity, sexual orientation and information about whether they used PrEP, a medication that can significantly reduce the risk of acquiring HIV.
Two analytics companies, Apptimize and Localytics, were identified in connection with the data-sharing allegations. Concerns about Grindr’s practices first gained widespread attention in 2018, when researchers revealed that HIV-related information was being provided to the companies. Grindr subsequently said it would stop sharing HIV-status information with them.
Under the new settlement, Grindr will pay £26 million, equivalent to roughly $35 million, in two installments. About $17.5 million is due by the end of 2026, with another approximately $17.5 million due by March 31, 2027.
The settlement does not mean Grindr admitted wrongdoing. The company disputes the allegations and said the agreement contains no finding or admission of liability. Grindr said the claims involve data practices from before 2020, when the company was controlled by Chinese gaming company Kunlun.
Grindr was sold to new U.S. owners in 2020 and later became a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange. The company says it has significantly overhauled its privacy practices since the period covered by the lawsuit and remains committed to transparency, user control and responsible handling of personal information.
The settlement comes after years of international scrutiny over Grindr’s handling of user data. Norwegian regulators previously fined the company for privacy violations involving the sharing of personal information for advertising purposes.
Although the latest settlement involves UK users rather than a class of U.S. users, the case has broader implications for Americans who use dating and social networking apps. These platforms can collect exceptionally sensitive information — including location, sexual orientation, relationship preferences and health-related details — raising questions about how much users know about where their information goes after they provide it.
For Grindr, the approximately $35 million agreement closes a major legal dispute over its historical privacy practices while allowing the company to continue denying the allegations. For users, the case is another reminder that information entered into an app — particularly health information — can become part of a much larger digital data trail.
