This text first appeared in Glamour.

So, for this reason we select the bear.

The Tea app, a women-only relationship platform that helps singles keep secure whereas navigating the world of heterosexual love, was hacked final week after it was focused on misogynistic platforms.

The app, which really had been in operation for 2 years earlier than its viral second final week, says on its web site that it was based with the assumption that ladies “ought to by no means have to compromise their security whereas relationship.” However now, the app says, 72,000 pictures of its customers have been stolen from its servers.

Right here’s every little thing you want to know, within the newest version of TL;DR.

Give me the TL;DR.

A women-only dating-safety app was hacked after it went viral on social media final week and induced a misogynistic meltdown on the web.

Wait, I would like extra. What’s the background right here?

Tea was based by tech entrepreneur Sean Cook dinner (sure, a person!) in 2023. In accordance to the app’s website, Cook dinner had the thought for the app after watching his mother wrestle with on-line relationship, experiencing each catfishing from males and unwittingly chatting with others who had prison data.

“My mother’s challenges with on-line relationship have been upsetting—and eye-opening. Nonetheless, after I introduced it up with my associates, I discovered it wasn’t simply my mother who was going by this; each lady I spoke to had an identical story,” Cook dinner instructed a startup information web site earlier this year. “The frequent thread was clear: relationship apps weren’t constructed with ladies’s security or emotional well-being in thoughts.”

Cook dinner partnered with an influencer and podcaster named Daniella Szetela, who later turned its head of socials, to design and launch the platform. On Tea, ladies can vet potential suitors utilizing expertise like reverse-image looking, getting into of their cellphone quantity to examine for “attainable marriages,” and background checks.

The app additionally hosts a “group chat,” the place ladies can share unhealthy relationship experiences with sure males and depend on each other for help. On this means, the app is a Silicon Valley–fied model of the “Are we relationship the identical man?” Facebook groups, which had proliferated organically over the previous few years to serve basically the identical goal.

Though the app has been round for some time, it went out of the blue viral final week, rocketing up to the highest of the US app retailer and sparking a complete lot of discourse.

Let me guess — some males on-line bought mad.

Yep! Apparently the thought of being rightfully referred to as out for treating ladies badly in a secure area was sufficient to throw some right into a rage.

Males urged others to report the app on subreddits for issues like “males’s rights” and “unpopular opinions,” assuming that many of the accounts on the app have been lies and blaming “ugly ladies” for spreading them. Stylish!

There have been additionally plenty of questions on how authorized posting on the app is, which CNN helpfully broke down and concluded: You’re in all probability secure.