Legal

AskedOut Community Guidelines

Effective 28 July 2026

AskedOut exists so that real people can meet honestly, safely, and on their own terms. Every profile on AskedOut is supposed to be a real adult, using their own name and their own photos, looking for a genuine connection. When that’s true, dating works. When it isn’t, people get hurt. These guidelines exist to keep it true.

We wrote these rules to be read, not skimmed. They apply to everything you do on AskedOut: your profile, your photos, your bio, your profile song, your messages, and your behaviour toward other members, including behaviour off the platform when it is connected to someone you met here. They form part of the Terms of Service you accepted when you created your account, and they apply to every member equally, whether you joined yesterday or subscribe to AskedOut+.

We have zero tolerance for objectionable content and abusive users. Reports are reviewed by humans, our target is action within 24 hours of a report, and the most serious violations mean an immediate, permanent ban on the first offence. If you take one thing from this page, take this: treat the person on the other side of the screen the way you’d want your best friend treated on a dating app. Almost everything below follows from that.

The rules at a glance

Everything on this page reduces to ten commitments. The sections below give each one its full meaning.

Be real. One account, your own recent photos, your real age, a name you actually go by.
Be respectful. No harassment, no hate, no cruelty. Rejection ends the conversation.
Keep it consensual. Sexual content only between adults who have both clearly said yes.
Protect minors absolutely. Anything that sexualizes or endangers a minor means a permanent ban and a report to the authorities.
No violence. No threats, no gore, no glorification, and no dangerous organizations.
No scams. The moment a conversation moves toward anyone’s money, it has broken the rules.
Keep it personal, not commercial. No selling, no promotion, no funnelling matches elsewhere.
Nothing illegal. Not in your profile, not in your messages, not arranged through the app.
Be discreet. Other members’ profiles, presence, and words are not yours to publish.
Play fair with the platform. No bots, no scraping, no ban evasion, no false reports.

How to read these rules

Four principles govern everything below, and they exist so that nobody can argue their way around a rule on a technicality.

Examples are illustrative, never exhaustive. Where a rule says “this includes”, it means what it says: the list shows the shape of the violation, it does not fence it in. Conduct that violates the evident purpose of a rule is treated as violating the rule, whether or not an example names it.
Attempting counts. Attempting, offering, requesting, arranging, or knowingly helping someone else to do a prohibited thing is treated the same as doing it.
Coded language counts. Euphemisms, emoji codes, slang, deliberate misspellings, initials, and content split across profile fields or messages to evade detection are read for what they plainly mean, not for how they are spelled.
Judgment, with accountability. Applying these rules requires human judgment, and we apply it proportionately: every enforcement action states its reasons, and every decision can be appealed (see Appeals). The interpretive latitude in points 1 to 3 is matched by that accountability; it is not a licence for us to act arbitrarily.

Adult nudity and sexual activity

Keep your profile something you could show a stranger in a café, because that is exactly what it is. Nudity, sexually explicit imagery, and depictions of sexual activity are not allowed in profile photos, bios, or profile content, even artistic, “tasteful”, or partially censored versions. Every profile photo passes automated moderation and human review before or shortly after it goes live, and photos that cross the line are removed with a notification to you.

Prohibited in profiles, this includes, but is not limited to:

nudity or sexual imagery, including where partially hidden by an emoji, a censor bar, cropping, or blur;
real or simulated sexual acts, and images where a sexual act is the evident subject;
sexually explicit text in your bio or prompts, or descriptions of sexual acts you seek;
links, handles, or references pointing to sexual content elsewhere.

In private conversations, the same principle applies through consent: sexual content is only ever acceptable between adults who have both clearly said they want it. Photos you receive that appear to contain nudity are blurred on your device until you choose to reveal them. That blur is not an invitation to test your luck. If there’s any doubt about whether someone wants to receive sexual content from you, there’s your answer: they don’t.

Sexual harassment

Sexual harassment is any unwelcome sexual behaviour, and on AskedOut it is a banning offence rather than a warning offence. This includes sending unsolicited sexual images (“cyberflashing”, which is also a criminal offence in France), making sexual comments about someone who hasn’t invited them, demanding sexual photos, continuing sexual conversation after someone has said no or changed the subject, and conditioning basic decency on sexual compliance.

This includes, but is not limited to:

unsolicited sexual images or videos, sent or requested;
sexually graphic opening messages;
pressuring, repeatedly asking, or bargaining for sexual photos or sexual conversation;
unsolicited sexual comments on someone’s body or photos;
punishing refusal: insults, degradation, or withdrawal of basic courtesy after someone declines.

Matching with someone is not consent to sexual conversation. Someone’s photos are not consent. Someone having engaged in flirtation earlier is not consent to more now. Consent is specific, it’s ongoing, and it can be withdrawn at any moment, and when it is, the conversation changes or ends. Members who send unsolicited sexual content are permanently banned on first offence.

Harassment and bullying

Don’t make anyone’s experience on AskedOut miserable. Insults, degrading comments, humiliation, intimidation, stalking behaviour, and sustained unwanted contact are all harassment, whether they happen in messages, in your bio, or anywhere else on the platform. That includes “revenge” behaviour after rejection: mocking someone’s appearance because they didn’t reply, berating a match who wants to end the conversation, or rallying others to pile on someone.

This includes, but is not limited to:

barrages of messages at someone who has not replied;
contacting someone through other platforms after they unmatched or blocked you here;
monitoring someone’s activity, appearing where they are uninvited, or other stalking behaviour;
insults or mockery about appearance, intelligence, or worth;
recruiting or encouraging others to target a member.

Rejection is part of dating. If someone unmatches you, blocks you, or simply stops responding, that is the answer, and it is final. Attempting to re-contact them through a new account, through friends, or through other apps is harassment, and we treat it as such even though part of it happens off AskedOut.

Hate speech and identity-based abuse

There is no place on AskedOut for content that attacks, demeans, or expresses contempt for people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, disability, serious illness, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, or age. This covers slurs, dehumanising language, hateful stereotypes, symbols associated with hate ideologies, and “preferences” phrased as insults toward entire groups. Stating who you’re interested in dating is fine; degrading everyone else is not.

This includes, but is not limited to:

slurs and epithets, including “reclaimed” ones aimed at people outside the group that reclaimed them;
dehumanising comparisons, and stereotypes presented as fact or humour;
symbols, numbers, or imagery associated with hate ideologies, in photos or text;
“no [group]” statements and other exclusions phrased to demean rather than to describe your own preferences;
deliberately degrading someone’s gender identity, including persistent purposeful misgendering.

Fetishization is the other face of the same problem. Reducing a person to a single attribute (their race, their disability, their trans identity, their body) and treating that attribute as the attraction (“I’ve always wanted to try a…”) is degrading even when it’s dressed up as a compliment. Nobody on AskedOut is a category to be collected. Your genuine preferences are your business; messaging someone to treat their identity as a fetish object is harassment, and we action it as harassment.

In France, public provocation to hatred, violence, or discrimination on these grounds (provocation à la haine, article 24 of the law of 29 July 1881) is a criminal offence, not just a rule violation. Hate speech leads to removal and account action, and content that appears to be unlawful under French law may be reported to the authorities.

Violent or graphic content

AskedOut is not the place for gore, graphic violence, depictions of serious physical harm, cruelty to people or animals, or imagery that glorifies violence, whether in photos, bios, or messages. Even when such content is legal, it has no role in helping two people decide whether to get a coffee together. Content that celebrates or trivialises real-world violence, including references to mass violence or attacks, is removed and the account is actioned.

Threats and incitement

Never threaten anyone, on AskedOut or through AskedOut. Threats of violence, death, sexual assault, or harm to someone’s family, property, or livelihood are among the most serious violations of these guidelines, and we do not distinguish between “real” threats and “jokes”; a threat that frightens its recipient has done its damage either way. Inciting or encouraging others to commit violence is treated the same as threatening it yourself.

This includes, but is not limited to:

explicit threats of violence, death, or sexual assault;
implied threats (“I know where you live”, “you should be careful”);
conditional threats (“if you don’t reply, I will…”);
threats against someone’s family, pets, property, reputation, immigration status, or livelihood;
filing or threatening false emergency reports against someone.

Threats are a first-offence permanent ban, and where a threat suggests a genuine risk to someone’s life or safety, we report it to law enforcement.

Dangerous organizations

You may not use AskedOut to promote, praise, represent, or recruit for terrorist organizations, violent extremist groups, organized hate groups, or criminal organizations. That includes using their symbols, slogans, or imagery in your profile, fundraising or recruiting for them in messages, or using the app to coordinate their activities. This is a zero-tolerance category: accounts are permanently banned, and content that appears to be terrorist content under EU and French law is reported to the authorities.

Child safety

AskedOut is strictly for adults aged 18 and over, and we have absolute zero tolerance for any content or behaviour that sexualises or endangers minors. This includes child sexual abuse material in any form, sexualised comments about minors, attempts to contact minors, requests for sexual content from anyone who may be underage, and photos of minors in any context. Even innocent family photos have no place on a dating profile, both for the child’s privacy and for everyone’s safety.

Any violation in this category results in an immediate, permanent ban on first offence, preservation of relevant evidence, and a report to law enforcement where the law requires or permits it. If you believe a member is under 18, report their profile immediately: underage reports are escalated for expedited handling, and confirmed underage accounts are removed.

Suicide and self-harm

If you’re struggling, you matter more than any rule on this page. In France, you can call 3114, the national suicide prevention line, which is free, confidential, and available 24/7. If someone is in immediate danger, call 112. If a match tells you they’re thinking about harming themselves, encourage them to call 3114, and report the conversation so we’re aware too.

What’s not allowed is content that promotes, glorifies, or instructs on suicide, self-harm, or eating disorders, whether in profiles or in messages, and, above all, encouraging another member to hurt themselves, which we treat as seriously as a threat of violence. Members who are themselves struggling and reach out for help are met with support, not punishment.

Impersonation and misrepresentation

Be who you say you are. You may not pretend to be another person (an ex, a celebrity, an acquaintance, a stranger whose photos you found) or a brand, organization, or fictional persona presented as real. Using someone else’s photos as your own is impersonation even if you never name them. Materially misrepresenting yourself to deceive matches (fake identity, fabricated life story constructed to manipulate) falls under the same rule, as does spreading demonstrably false claims designed to deceive members or put them at risk; being flattering is human, but being fictional is a violation.

AskedOut offers optional photo verification: a live selfie taken in-app and compared against your profile photos, earning a “verified” badge. Verification is optional, but honesty isn’t.

One person, one profile: authenticity

Every AskedOut profile represents exactly one real person: you. Your photos must clearly show you and be recent enough that a match would recognise you across a table. The app checks on your device that every photo contains a visible face before it’s even uploaded. No couple accounts, no accounts operated “on behalf of” a friend, no shared logins, no fake profiles, no AI-generated faces or personas, and no stock photos, filtered images that no longer look like you, or photos where it’s unclear which person is you as your primary shot. Your display name must be a name you actually go by, not a brand, a slogan, or someone else’s name. Every photo passes automated and human moderation, and profiles built on someone else’s face don’t survive review.

A specific word on AI imagery, because the tools are everywhere now. Light editing is nothing new, but the test hasn’t changed: the person who walks into the café must match the person in the profile. Photos generated or altered by AI to the point that they misrepresent your appearance are fake photos, an entirely synthetic “you” is a fake profile, and letting an AI conduct your conversations fails the one-real-person rule just as surely. Creating imagery of another real person without their consent (a “deepfake”) is impersonation at best, and where such imagery is sexual, we treat it as a non-consensual intimate image with everything that entails below.

Post only content you have the right to post: photos that are yours to share, and a profile song chosen from the in-app catalogue. Content that infringes someone else’s copyright or trademark may be removed.

One account per person. Duplicate accounts, including “backup” accounts, may all be removed.

Age accuracy

Your date of birth must be real. Lying about your age, in either direction, undermines the one thing every member must be able to rely on: that everyone here is a consenting adult who is who they claim to be. Misstating your age to appear older or younger is grounds for account action, and any account found to belong to someone under 18 is removed, with underage reports escalated for expedited handling as described above. You can hide your displayed age with the in-app setting if you prefer; you cannot falsify it.

Scams and romance fraud

Romance fraud destroys lives, and we hunt it aggressively. You may not use AskedOut to defraud, deceive, or financially exploit anyone. That includes classic romance scams (building affection and then manufacturing an emergency that needs money), investment and cryptocurrency “opportunities” (including so-called pig-butchering schemes), requests for gift cards, transfers, or banking details, phishing links, fake verification sites, and any scheme designed to move a conversation toward your wallet. Unsolicited financial “help” is treated the same way: AskedOut is not a channel for investment advice, trading signals, cryptocurrency coaching, or introductions to “someone who can grow your money”. Offering any of these to matches is a violation whether or not money has changed hands yet.

Beyond the schemes above, this includes, but is not limited to:

manufactured emergencies: medical bills, customs fees, stranded travel, a ticket to come and see you;
loan requests, “temporary” transfers, and overpayment or refund tricks;
directing matches to fake “verification” or “safety check” sites, especially ones that ask for card details;
asking anyone to read out a security code sent to their phone, which is how accounts get stolen;
any offer to “teach” investing, trading, or cryptocurrency, however patient and personal it sounds.

Protect yourself too: never send money, financial details, or gifts to someone you have not met in person, no matter how long you have been talking or how convincing the story is. If anyone on AskedOut asks you for money, stop and report the conversation. Scammers are permanently banned on first offence.

Spam and solicitation

AskedOut conversations are for connecting, not converting. Don’t send repetitive or bulk messages, chain messages, or identical openers blasted across matches; don’t drop links to external sites, surveys, or downloads; don’t use matches as an audience for anything other than getting to know each other. Systematically funnelling matches to another platform for gain (“I’m never on here, follow me on [platform]” as a growth tactic) is solicitation, and so is harvesting matches for contact lists or marketing.

Commercial activity and promotion

AskedOut is not a marketplace, a billboard, or a recruiting channel. You may not use your profile or messages to advertise or sell products or services, promote businesses, events, or venues, grow a social-media following, solicit donations or crowdfunding, recruit for jobs, multi-level marketing, or “opportunities”, or conduct research, journalism, or experiments on members without our written permission. Mentioning your job or passion project in your bio is normal; using the platform as a customer-acquisition tool is a violation.

Prostitution, escort services and trafficking

You may not use AskedOut to offer, advertise, solicit, or arrange commercial sexual services of any kind: prostitution, escorting, sugar arrangements involving compensation for sexual or romantic companionship, or the sale of sexual content, including promoting paid adult-content subscriptions or “exclusive content” of a sexual nature on any platform. In France, purchasing sexual acts is itself a criminal offence, and pimping (proxénétisme) and human trafficking are serious crimes.

Any content or behaviour suggesting human trafficking or sexual exploitation, including offering another person for commercial sex, results in an immediate permanent ban and a report to law enforcement.

Drugs and regulated goods

Don’t use AskedOut to buy, sell, promote, or arrange the supply of illegal drugs or other illicit substances, and don’t build your profile around drug use or drug imagery. This includes photos featuring drugs or paraphernalia, bios advertising availability (“ask me about…”, emoji codes included; we know what the maple leaf and the snowflake mean), and messages arranging transactions. The same applies to other regulated goods: counterfeit products, stolen goods, prescription medicines outside legal channels, and tobacco or alcohol sales. Mentioning honestly that you drink or smoke in your lifestyle fields is fine; dealing is not.

Firearms

Profiles featuring firearms or other weapons are not allowed (no photos posing with guns, knives brandished for effect, or weapon imagery used to intimidate or impress), and you may not use AskedOut to buy, sell, trade, or advertise firearms, ammunition, explosives, or weapon accessories. France strictly regulates weapons, and a dating app is no place to display or deal in them. Photos in a clearly lawful professional or sporting context may be reviewed case by case, but when in doubt, we remove.

Illegal activities

Beyond every rule already listed: you may not use AskedOut to commit, facilitate, promote, or celebrate any activity that is illegal under French law or the law that applies to you. That includes fraud, extortion, money laundering, trafficking of any kind, offences against persons, and unlawful content of any category. AskedOut operates in France and cooperates with French and EU authorities as the law requires; conduct that is criminal offline does not become acceptable because it happens in a chat window.

Privacy violations and doxxing

Other people’s private lives are not yours to expose. Never share another person’s private information without their consent: home address, phone number, email, workplace, real name (where they haven’t shared it), financial details, health information, or private messages published to shame or expose them (“outing” someone’s orientation is a particularly serious form of this). Threatening to reveal such information is treated the same as revealing it.

This includes, but is not limited to:

posting or forwarding someone’s address, phone number, workplace, schedule, or live location;
publishing private messages or profile details to shame, expose, or “expose the truth about” someone;
revealing someone’s sexual orientation, gender identity, health status, or presence on a dating app to people they have not told;
assembling publicly available details into a package whose evident purpose is to intimidate.

Never share intimate images of another person without their consent. In France, transmitting or publishing sexual images of a person without their consent, even images they originally shared willingly, is a criminal offence (article 226-2-1 of the Code pénal, “revenge porn”), punishable by up to two years’ imprisonment and a €60,000 fine. On AskedOut it is a first-offence permanent ban, and we report it to the authorities where the law provides. As a design choice, screenshots and screen recording are blocked in the app on a best-effort basis, but the rule is about your behaviour rather than what the software can catch.

Discretion

Part of meeting someone honestly is that both of you chose to be here. Do not publicize another member’s presence on AskedOut, post their profile or photos elsewhere, or quote your private conversations in public to mock, shame, or expose them. Sharing a profile privately with a friend to ask “is this person genuine?” or to stay safe before a date is fine, and so is reporting it to us; putting it on the internet is not. Where such a post also reveals private facts or intimate images, the doxxing and intimate-image rules above apply with full force.

Off-platform behaviour

What happens on a date matters here too. If you harm, harass, threaten, assault, defraud, or stalk someone you met through AskedOut, whether on another app, over the phone, or in person, we will take action on your AskedOut account, up to a permanent ban, regardless of where the behaviour occurred. We may also act on credible information about serious off-platform conduct, including criminal convictions for violent or sexual offences, where allowing continued access would put members at risk. Meeting someone through AskedOut never entitles you to their time, attention, or body afterwards.

Misuse of reporting

Reporting exists to protect people, and it only works if it’s honest. Don’t file knowingly false reports to retaliate against someone who rejected you, to silence someone, or to game moderation; don’t coordinate mass reporting against a member who hasn’t broken the rules. Under the Digital Services Act we may suspend the processing of reports from members who frequently submit manifestly unfounded ones, and deliberate, malicious false reporting is itself a violation that can cost you your account. Honest reports made in good faith are never punished, even when we ultimately decide no rule was broken.

The same respect these guidelines demand toward members applies to the humans behind the app: abusing, threatening, or attempting to deceive our moderation and support staff is a violation like any other.

Ban evasion

A ban means you are no longer welcome on AskedOut, not that you should try again with a new email address. Creating a new account after being banned, helping a banned member return, or operating an account on a banned member’s behalf are all violations, and evading accounts are removed as soon as they’re identified, without warning. If you believe your ban was a mistake, the right path is an appeal (see below), not a new account: an appeal can genuinely reverse a wrong decision, while ban evasion only confirms the right one.

Platform integrity

Don’t manipulate the platform. That means no bots or automated accounts, no automated swiping, liking, or messaging, no scripts or third-party tools that interact with AskedOut on your behalf, no scraping or harvesting of member data or photos, no fake engagement schemes, no circumventing swipe limits or other product boundaries, no probing, reverse engineering, or exploiting bugs, and no interfering with moderation or security systems. It also means no falsifying your location to appear somewhere you are not, and no buying, selling, renting, or transferring accounts; an account belongs to the one person who created it.

If you find a vulnerability, tell us at contact@askedout.com and we will be grateful; exploit it and you are gone. Real people put real information into AskedOut trusting that only other real people will see it. Protecting that trust is non-negotiable.

How reporting works on AskedOut

Reporting a message. Long-press any message in a conversation to report it, choosing a reason category. Because text messages on AskedOut are end-to-end encrypted, we cannot read your conversations; we only see a reported message’s content when you, the reporter, choose to attach it. Attaching the message gives our reviewers the evidence they need.

Reporting a profile. Open any member’s profile and report it with a reason category, covering fake profiles, underage users, inappropriate photos, scams, and everything else in these guidelines. You don’t need to be matched with someone to report their profile.

Block and unmatch. You can unmatch or block anyone, instantly and without explanation. Blocking ends the match, closes the conversation, and makes you invisible to each other. Blocking is your call. You never need to justify it, and the other person is not told you reported them.

What happens next. Every report is reviewed by a human, with a target of action within 24 hours. Reviewers look at the reported content, the reason you selected, and the evidence available. If we take action on a member’s content or account, that member receives a statement of reasons explaining what was actioned and why (Digital Services Act, art. 17), including at sign-in if their account is suspended. We don’t reveal reporter identities. Evidence attached to reports is retained only as long as moderation requires, then deleted under our retention rules.

Not a member? You can still report. Anyone, including people who do not use AskedOut, can notify us of illegal content under the EU Digital Services Act by writing to contact@askedout.com with enough detail for us to locate the content. We acknowledge and process these notices as the DSA requires.

The enforcement ladder

Consequences scale with severity and history. Depending on the violation, action on your account can be:

Warning: a formal notice that specific behaviour or content violated these guidelines. One warning is the only one you should ever need.
Content removal: the violating photo, bio text, or message is removed, with a notification telling you what and why.
Limited account: restrictions on features while a pattern of behaviour is assessed.
Suspension: temporary loss of access to your account.
Ban: permanent removal from AskedOut.

Where the problem is a single photo, bio field, or message and the breach is not severe, action starts with that content: it is removed or rejected, you are told what was actioned and why, and your account stays in good standing while you fix it. Accounts are actioned when the behaviour, not just the content, is the problem.

Severe categories skip the ladder entirely and go straight to a permanent ban on first offence: child safety violations, sexual harassment and unsolicited sexual content, threats of violence, terrorist or hate-organization content, human trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation, non-consensual intimate images, scams and romance fraud, and serious off-platform harm. Repeated lower-level violations also climb the ladder quickly. The ladder is a chance to correct course, not a licence for four free violations.

Where content or behaviour appears to be illegal, we may preserve evidence and report it to the competent authorities, including the French PHAROS platform (internet-signalement.gouv.fr) and law enforcement, in particular for child safety offences, credible threats to life or safety, and terrorist content. Members can and should also report illegal online content directly to PHAROS.

Appeals

Humans make our moderation decisions, and humans sometimes get it wrong, so every decision can be contested. If your content was removed or your account was warned, limited, suspended, or banned and you believe we made a mistake, write to contact@askedout.com from the email address on your account, tell us which decision you’re contesting, and explain why. A human who was not the original decision-maker reviews contested decisions, and if we got it wrong, we reverse the action. Appeals are also how reporters can contest a decision not to act on their report.

A closing note

Most of you will never see a warning, because most people on AskedOut are exactly what this app is built for: real adults, being decent to each other, hoping the next conversation is the good one. These guidelines exist for the small minority who spoil that, and for you to know exactly where we stand when they do.

A last word on safety: we don’t run criminal background checks, and no set of rules replaces your own judgment. Meet in public, tell a friend where you’re going, arrange your own transport, and keep your home address and financial details to yourself until trust is earned. The app will warn you before you send a street address to a match. The warning is advisory, but it is worth listening to. More guidance lives in the app under Settings → Dating safely.

We may update these guidelines as the community grows and the law evolves; the current version at askedout.com/guidelines always applies. Questions, notices, and appeals: contact@askedout.com.

Version 2.3, effective 28 July 2026.