The love seekers of the world collectively freaked out on April 4 after determining that Facebook had ruined their chances at finding their soulmates. We’re talking, of course, about Facebook’s recent changes to how third-party apps are able to interact with the social network. While it may be a needed change in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica privacy debacle, it apparently had some unintended consequences, like locking people out of their Tinder accounts. Luckily, Tinder was able to rectify the situation, and had the app back up and running a few hours after disaster struck.
But wait, you say — how could Facebook possibly affect my Tinder account? Well, the problem is that in order to sign into Tinder, you must sign into your Facebook account. So now that Facebook is tweaking the way in which it works with these independent apps, things are getting a bit hairy.
If you tried to log into your Tinder account yesterday, you likely received an error message that read, “Facebook Permissions. Tinder requires you provide additional Facebook permissions in order to use a Tinder account. This information is used to create fuller profiles, verify authenticity and provide support.”
Basically, it would appear that Facebook had revoked Tinder’s permissions, which also meant that it revoked your ability to meet and potentially fall in love with new people. Even if you followed Tinder’s prompts, the issue was not resolved, and users remained unable to swipe left or right.
Twitter, of course, wasted no time in raising the alarm. Tons of Twitter users have complained about being unable to access their accounts, and have pointed the finger squarely at Facebook. One user tweeted, “Facebook’s API changes just broke Tinder. It throws you into an endless login loop. Bravo to Facebook for being considerate of their only valuable product.”
Facebook’s API changes just broke Tinder. It throws you into an endless login loop. Bravo to Facebook for being considerate of their only valuable product. pic.twitter.com/QbJA1uTi0v
— Daniel Sinclair (@_DanielSinclair) April 4, 2018
Happily, all has now been resolved, though Tinder did not confirm whether or not Facebook was in fact to blame. The dating app told Digital Trends, “A technical issue prevented some users from accessing Tinder [yesterday]. We found a resolution and quickly resumed service. We ask our users to ensure that they have updated the app and are running the most recent version.”
Updated on April 5: Tinder has addressed the issue preventing users from logging into the dating app.
