What to Know
Dating apps, and dating online in general, have never been easy or felt safe. Yet here we are, decades into widespread internet usage, and plenty of people still try to find ‘the one’ through dating apps. So it should come as a shock to literally no one that ICE may be using these apps to target undocumented, or allegedly undocumented women in the United States.
One woman on TikTok shared a video where she claims women across the U.S. should be aware of a dating app scam involving male ICE officers targeting them through the app. Dating apps were already scary, my guy. Now you have to go ahead and make them absolutely horrifying by pretending to be there for love and really make a profile just to fill some inhumane quota? Cool, cool, cool.
As if dating apps weren’t already dangerous before ICE.
@itsbritwitch #lamigra #ice #southcarolina #tinder #charlestonsc ♬ original sound – itsbritwitch
In her video, the TikTok user claims that ICE agents are using dating apps to “kidnap” women. While that might seem like a stretch to some, that’s the best word to describe a lot of interactions between ICE agents, who are barely uniformed, and individuals who are accosted by them in their cars, their places of work, or just walking down the street.
“All of you women, get off dating apps,” the TikToker says in her video. “Just get off of them. It’s done. They’re done. They’re using them to arrest women and imprison women, so we’re off of those. Good luck. Thanks.”
She also says in her video that a woman from Columbia was, at the time she posted the video, “missing for 24 hours” after such an incident allegedly happened through a dating app. Instead of women sharing their fears at the idea of being targeted by ICE agents this way, plenty of them commented on the TikTok to share their renewed sense of purpose when it comes to Tinder and other apps.
“Catfishing ICE was not on my bingo card but it’s now on my to do list,” one woman wrote.
Another added, “So you telling me I need to make several catfish profiles and set up so many dates and ghost [ICE] to eat up their budget? Say less.”
Someone else added their own experience that sort of backs up this claim of ICE using dating apps to target women.
“I’ve noticed an increase in people on dating apps asking where I was born,” she wrote. “Like, who asks that? This would make so much sense.”
Some women are allegedly dating ICE agents just to expose who they are.
Given this theory that ICE is using dating apps to find undocumented women and detain them, it’s not too surprising that, outside of this TikTok altogether, women have reportedly taken it upon themselves to catfish ICE agents. Just in case we need a little refresher in internet lingo, catfishing refers to pretending to be someone you aren’t online. You know, kind of like ICE agents may or may not be doing on dating apps.
Per a Reddit post, women are meeting men who are ICE agents, just so they can take photos of them without masks or face coverings and let other people know what ICE agents look like behind their masks. Maybe it’s not catfishing per se, but this method means the women involved certainly don’t have any intention of finding a love match.
