Consumers looking for love on dating service Match.com could find more than they were bargaining for following reports that rogue ads are putting users at risk of losing personal information and even cyber ransom.
The issue, which it is thought only affects the UK site, has led to the suspension of advertising on the service. It concerns the serving up of so-called malware which can steal personal information, send spam emails and operate silently within users’ devices without their consent. It is understood that the site has about 5.5 million UK users.
A spokesman for Match.com said: “We take the security of our members very seriously. Earlier today we took the precautionary measure of temporarily suspending advertising on our UK site while we investigated a potential malware issue.
“Our security experts were able to identify and isolate the affected adverts, this does not represent a breach of our site or our users’ data.
“To date we have not received any reports from our users that they have been affected by these adverts. Nonetheless, we advise all users to protect themselves from this type of cyber-threat by updating their antivirus / anti malware software.”