David Crary AP October 6, 2014, 11:01 am
For gay men in the dozens of countries that criminalise their sex lives, social networking can be a blessing or a curse.
High-tech dating apps and social media have enabled countless men to expand their circles of friends and lovers in settings that are hostile to any overt trace of homosexuality. Yet the same technology that they gratefully embrace can expose them to the risk of blackmail, arrest and violence.
In one chilling case earlier in 2014 in Pakistan, police arrested a paramedic on suspicion of killing three men he had met via the gay social network Manjam, which is based in London but has many users in Asia and the Middle East. The suspect told police he considered homosexuality to be evil.
More recently, bloggers and activists raised concerns about how the popular dating app Grindr could be used to pinpoint a user's exact location - even a user living where gay sex is outlawed. After complaints mounted, Grindr in September announced steps to reduce the risks for users in countries with a record of anti-gay violence - including Russia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Liberia, Sudan and Zimbabwe.
And during the past couple of weeks, Grindr has posted a warning to its users in Egypt that police - as part of an ongoing crackdown on gays - "may be posing as LGBT to entrap you". The warning urged users to be careful when arranging meetings with strangers.
Grindr's chief executive, Joel Simkhai, says his Los Angeles-based company strives to maximise security and privacy for all its users, yet he cautions that governments hostile to gays can muster powerful surveillance resources.
"They have a lot of control and smarts on their side," he said. "We try to use the latest technologies on our end, but so do they, so this tension will continue.
"If your security is a big issue for you," he added, "a location-based service might not be the best option".
The potential perils of social networking have attracted the attention of the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, a New York-based watchdog group.
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Social networking poses risk for O/S gays