Facebook Dating: End for underage users with new mechanism  

Using machine learning technology

About three years after Facebook Dating debuted , Meta is now taking steps to prevent underage users from using the dating platform.

Going into details, as was done with Instagram last summer, Meta once again enlists the machine learning technology of the company Yoti, adding a mechanism to Facebook to automatically confirm the age of users. Specifically, when Facebook’s systems suspect that a minor is trying to use Dating, the platform will ask them to provide more information to continue.

Users will be able to prove they are adults either by uploading a short video with their phone’s selfie camera or by uploading a photo of their ID. In both cases the data will only be used for age identification and then deleted. It is worth noting that in the case of the video, Yoti’s machine learning algorithm will undertake to calculate the user’s age according to his facial features.

Meta claims to have had great success using Yoti’s software. For example, on Instagram this technology has stopped 96% of teenagers from changing their birthday to appear to be over 18. Age verification on Facebook Dating is currently only available in the US, but will be coming to even more countries once more testing is done.