The
US government is pushing the Chinese gaming and technology company, Beijing
Kunlun Tech, to sell the popular gay dating application Grindr, over concerns that
Chinese ownership of the social platform threatens US national security, said
the Financial Times.
The Committee on Foreign Investment in the US (CFIUS), the inter-agency US
group that vets foreign deals, signalled an intensifying scrutiny of acquisitions
involving social networks or companies with vast troves of personal
information, raising questions about whether Chinese buyers would be forbidden
from buying a wide range of social networking companies in the future.
The specific concerns CFIUS has over the acquisition of an application like
Grindr were not specified, however, a former senior US intelligence official
warned that the government was increasingly nervous that Beijing could use its
data to coerce US officials or members of the public.
Grindr allows users to share photos and personal data including their location, age, sexual preferences and HIV status.