A new dating site is about to emerge in an already complete market. “The Club of Beautiful Souls”, launched by Karine Le Marchand, listen to the “lack of verification and security” in Internet meetings.
If love is in the meadow, it is still necessary to show the white leg to enter it. Because, which is immediately surprising is the strict controls required for registration. Level of studies, family situation, sexual orientation, photos … candidates must answer a long questionnaire (composed of 100 mandatory questions, which should take them between 30 and 50 minutes) and transmit their payment sheets, as well as a declaration of wealth. “We also ask them open questions (…) And in the end, we really manage to know who they are,” explains the host of “Love is in the Prado.”
The profiles are grouped by affinities and are invited to meet in small groups, in an environment considered less intimidating than a tête-à-tête. To supervise these exchanges, the club even imposes a moral letter: without “ghost”, everyone must justify the end of a relationship. Operation based on the selection and strict control of the members.
But such a collection of personal data obviously raises strong questions about respect for privacy.
“Important challenges in privacy protection”
Questioned by Tech & coAntoine Cheron, lawyer and specialist in intellectual property and new technology, emphasizes that “the Club of Beautiful Souls collects a very significant volume of personal data, which obviously poses important problems in terms of privacy.” He specifies: “Among this information is called data sensitive Within the meaning of the General Regulation of Data Protection (GDPR). “
These data refer to particular ethnic or racial origin, sexual orientation, health status (physical or mental), followed medical treatments, or even religious and philosophical beliefs.
Article 9 of the GDPR strictly supervises the collection of this information: “Personal data that reveal racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical convictions or union membership, as well as genetic, biometric data, with respect to health, sexual life or sexual orientation of a natural person” can only be treated with very restrictive conditions, he explains. He explains to me.
A quotation site … like others?
In the case of Karine Le Marchand Meeting Club, “the privacy policy establishes the collection of explicit consent before the collection of certain confidential data,” says Antoine Cheron. But he adds: “Given the nature and volume of the data collected, the strong security obligations weigh in the controller (articles 5 and 32 of the GDPR), to guarantee the confidentiality, integrity and availability of data.” Therefore, significant security is necessary to guarantee the protection of this type of data.
Contacted, the National Data Protection Commission (CNIL) recalls that “the user’s consent does not justify the collection of any data.” The details of the body: “An application can only collect strictly necessary information for its objective. This is the principle of proportionality and minimization of data. It must clearly indicate what data are mandatory or optional, and favor the least possible intrusive documents. The company must be able to document and justify the relevance of each data collected.”
The CNIL also explains that “many sites encourage Internet users to complete a maximum of optional information on their profile page.” And it reminds users: “Ask yourself about the interest of publishing very intimate information (sexual preferences, physical state, religion, etc.) that in the case of unofficial dissemination could provide prejudices.” In other words, trusting this information is a real risk in case of piracy, for example.
Especially because other meeting applications have already suffered confidential data from its users. In January 2025, more than 30 million location identifiers had been stolen from Tinder or Grindr and put online in a Russian computer pirates forum. Data that can be used to track, blackmail or identify people, and in some cases soldiers or policies, ultimately, testifying the complex and confidential issue of the exchange of very personal information in this type of site or application. There is no doubt that intentions are as beautiful as souls in this project, but those of pirates are usually much less …
Source: BFM TV
