--- title: "Cursed New Dating App Matches You Based on the Most Deranged Thing We Can Imagine" description: "A new dating app matches potential lovers based on their entire internet browsing histories — and we're not quite sure how we feel about it." date: "2025-06-20" modified: "2025-06-20" authors: - name: "Noor Al-Sibai" job_title: "Senior Staff Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/nooralsibai" url: "https://futurism.com/dating-app-matches-browsing-history" categories: - "Future Society" tags: - "apps" - "dating" - "dating apps" - "privacy" --- # Cursed New Dating App Matches You Based on the Most Deranged Thing We Can Imagine ![]() *\Image: Getty / Futurism\* A newly-developed dating app matches potential lovers based on their entire internet browsing histories — and we're not quite sure how we feel about it. As [*Wired* reports](), the new service is straightforwardly-named "Browser Dating," and is the brainchild of Belgian *artiste provocateur* Dries Depoorter. After years creating one-off projects like "[Shirt]()," a top that increases one euro each time it's purchased, Depoorter took a different route with his new app that invites lonely users to upload their entire internet footprint — blessedly sans "Incognito" mode — in pursuit of love. "Instead of choosing the best pictures or best things about yourself, this will show a side of you that you’d never pick," the artist says of the site, which launched earlier in June. "You’re not able to choose from your search history — you have to upload all of it." If that sounds like a privacy nightmare to you, you're not alone — and although Depoorter claims Browser Dating "is not exposed to the internet," *Futurism* found when going through the site's application process that that might not be the case. Pretty soon into the application, Browser Dating asks users to download an extension that will give the site permission to access and export your browsing history. Though Depoorter stores user information on Firebase, Google's data storage platform used in developing AI apps, there's no reason that bad actors couldn't [breach the extension]() itself, as we've seen as recently as [February of this year](). As *Wired* notes, the artist has previously played with the concept of privacy invasion. In 2018, for instance, he used public surveillance camera [footage of people jaywalking]() to create art. The "[surveillance artist]()," as the *New York Times* once called Depoorter, returned to his voyeurism for "[The Follower]()," a 2022 project that used webcams in public spaces to record people as they took selfies. In both projects, it seems that Depoorter published footage of his unwitting subjects without consent — which doesn't exactly set a great precedent for his new app, though he insists it's not a gimmick. We've reached out to the artist to ask what precautions, if any, he's taken to protect against any breach of the Browser Dating extension. All told, this *Futurism* reporter didn't complete the site's registration once asked to download the extension. As always, it's better to be safe than sorry. More on dating and privacy: [*Woman Alarmed When Date Uses ChatGPT to Psychologically Profile Her*]() ## Author At Futurism, I've often been drawn to unpacking the narratives that underlie technological, scientific and medical progress, with a special interest in areas of conflict and ambiguity that end up setting agendas and steering the fates of both elites and the hoi polloi. I'm a committed generalist, but I often find myself returning to work involving NASA and the private space sector, the effects of AI on media and society, and the mechanics of the pharmaceutical industry, with a specific focus on the spread of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. Prior to Futurism, I worked for publications ranging from Media Matters and Truthdig to Raw Story and Bustle. I'm also the author of "Myspace Scene Queens," a 2024 title in Instar Books' acclaimed "Remember the Internet" series. My work at Futurism has been cited by outlets including the New Yorker, Slate, Nieman Lab, the Verge, the MIT Technology Review, the Sunday Times, and the Daily Beast. I grew up in North Carolina, attended the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and now live in Brooklyn, New York. In my free time, I'm an avid reader and music fan; you can probably find me at a local poetry reading, concert, underground rave, or DJ set. I'm the proud parent of an ineffable orange cat named Mee-Mow. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()