You never know who you’ll meet on Grindr. A few months ago, Steven Petrow struck up a conversation with a guy on the popular dating app.
“He had a job, he had an adorable pooch—and he was friends with people I knew in the flesh. So I gave him my cell number and asked him to call me about 10 p.m. that night,” he writes in a new column piece.
NBD, right?
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“Just after 10 he texted that he was at a restaurant around the corner—and he pulled into my driveway two minutes later,” Petrow writes.
He hadn’t given the man his address or even made concrete plans for them to meet. When he asked how the stranger figured out where he lived, he replied, “That was easy – you gave me your phone number.”
Petrow says he was “freaked out.” After all, who tracks down a person’s address using their cellphone number? Other than a stalker, that is.
After doing some investigating, he learned that once you have a person’s cellphone number, you can actually look up a person’s full name, home address, real age, and more using a $5-a-month premium subscription to WhitePages. From there, you can pretty much Google anything you want about a person.
Eric Silverberg, CEO of Scruff, tells Petrow this is precisely when you should “be thoughtful and cautious” about who you give your phone number to on dating apps.
“If you switch [from the app]to text messaging, there’s no community support to protect you and it’s going to be much harder for you to get help if there’s ever some kind of issue,” he says.
Understandably paranoid, Petrow says he now uses a Google Voice number for arranging hookups, sexts, and sending photos.
Related: Hilarious Instagram account offers inspirational messages to guys fed up with Grindr
“I didn’t want to be tracked down again, so I got a Google Voice number, which rings on my cell phone,” he explains. “I can send and receive texts, listen to voicemails, and block numbers. I now give out that number instead of my real cell.”
The downside is that anyone who looked up the Google Voice number will find nothing and likely assume he’s catfishing them.
“Oh well,” he writes. “Life is far from perfect.”
Have you ever had someone from a dating app show up at your place unannounced? How did you handle it? Share your stories in the comments section below…
Larry
If I give someone my phone number, I will give them my address also. I dont get why this guy was upset.
eddiesocket
Jesus Christ. You seriously okay with strangers arriving at your house unannounced? You’re not a well person. Get help. And please don’t do that to anyone.
Danny595
#PromiscuityProblems
Cai
Not necessarily. It’s called DATING. It’s actualy a reality that not all guys go sleeping on a first date. How how else do you expect to find out if you’re compatible with someone or not?
Vince
@Danny595. Like anyone would use you for anything other then a target practice.
DarkZephyr
@Cai, well he did mention that he uses Google Voice for hookups so he clearly does sleep with some of them. He doesn’t trust them to know where he lives but he is gonna screw them anyway. lol God what a shallow and self centered age we live in.
am_psi
So screw the a bunch of guys you don’t deem worthy of having your phone number or address. Healthy choices.
DarkZephyr
Right? lol
charlie_jackpot
Is this article an advert for WhitePages or Google Voice?
Knight
LOL!!! “brought to you by your friends at Google. Google: we filter those aspects about reality we’d rather you not see….and you’re going to like it.”
Blatant “product placement” aside, the first thing I thought when i read this was “amateur”. Of COURSE you use google voice for ANY/ALL transactions that don’t involve your friends or work. This is just basic intelligence. Free phone numbers/text is the only good thing Google has going for it (the search engine sucks and is an attempt at thought control).
CanadianGuy62
I was thinking the same thing…this was simply an ad.
Heywood Jablowme
If this is your “worst nightmare,” you’ve certainly led a very sheltered life!
PinkoOfTheGange
it was so much easier when 85 cents/month got you an unlisted number.
Knight
Hey…anyone else catch that they chose a picture of an Asian man to epitomize this article?
Those liberals sure aren’t playing into stereotypes, bigoted or intolerant at all….no, sir…
Jack Meoff
Hadn’t thought about it until you pointed it out. That says more about you than it does about the article.
Knight
It says I’m on to their clueless, not-so-subtle racism, yes.
seki
So what kind of person should they have used instead?
Jack Meoff
So people complain that Queerty doesn’t show enough diversity in the races represented in their articles but apparently that only applies to certain articles. Now you only want racial diversity in selected articles and not if there is a chance the article could have a negative spin on it because, you know, that would be racist. You can’t have it both ways.
Knight
Why, a skinny, blonde twink of course. Who else?
Knight
Jack I never said anything about wanting diversity anywhere. You have me confused with someone else. I’m saying it’s ironic that Queerty is the place that on one hand is trying to uphold all those ultra-liberal values of inclusion, diversity, etc, yet when they chose a picture of someone who is supposedly a stalker, they went for an unattractive Asian man with a look of desperation.
You can unbunch your panties now, cup-cake. Time for you to move on.
brian_chen
Agreed. Wtf
brian_chen
What sickens me are the gays who can’t understand the issues other minorities face. You would think being a minority would make you less ignorant but I guess if it doesn’t affect you, then screw the other minorities right?
brian_chen
“Now you only want racial diversity in selected articles”. This is the dumbest thing I’ve read — “sure in the few times we represent Asians we’re going to make them look bad….wait you don’t like that?”
seki
Why is picturing a skinny blonde (presumably white) twink more acceptable than an asian man in this article?
brian_chen
It’s representation. Count how many times queerty has represented Asians positively and a white twink positively and how many negatively respectively. Proportionately it’s biased.
Knight
Hey Brian, nice to meet you. Please start posting on Queerty more often! Most of the people here are total trolls/pussies who don’t use their real pics and are just plain dull. People like you BRING IT! ; )
jkb
I was thinking the same thing. Kind of a subliminal way of reinforcing the “no Asians” request on Grndr profiles. They’re stalkers too!
Rex Huskey
Asian? Looks Mexican to me.
Hogwasher
What ethnicity would you prefer they use or you would deem acceptable to your conservative paranoia?
seki
My reply is still awaiting moderation so it’s probably never going to be posted. Let’s try again:
Thanks Knight, I’m not a troll or a p***y. As a mixed-race person I was genuinely trying to work out the reasoning behind your comment.
Brian, thanks for taking the time to explain it, I understand now. I’m not on Queerty often enough to have noticed the representation problem of the site.
Howard Roark
Bizarre. So it is OK to show a white person in a negative context, but not OK to show an Asian person in a negative context. Oh, clutch my pearls, racists! RACISTS!
Cai
This guy’s a rookie. Chat on the app, have a few dates first. If I dig ya, THEN I’ll give you my number.
DarkZephyr
So you will go out on *dates* with people *before* you give them your number? Then the guys you date are the rookies. There is no way in HELL I would ever go on a date with a guy who won’t let me know who the hell he is.
Knight
Cai then you are seriously in the minority here. Most of these apps are for quick hook-ups, not long, drawn-out romances. Most guys would lose interest with you if you are not available and DTF within the first or second interaction.
brian_chen
Seriously? When it’s about hot guys, you don’t feature any asians as the main picture. When it’s about a creep, you highlight an asian guy?
This is how you choose to represent Asians in the very few times you show them?
Knight
Preach.
RomanHans
I read the headline and saw the picture and thought, “Oh no they didn’t.”
They did.
If you’re looking for a serious discussion about gays and racism, though, you’re in the wrong place. The commenters here are all trolls and angry closeted dudes. Maybe one in ten is worth talking to.
Knight
Roman I agree, absolutely. Though I have to say, I’ve met some pretty cool guys on here who have very intelligent things to say and often have some good discussions. Unfortunately, Queerty is like an outhouse in Las Vegas; sometimes you have to sift through shit to find that diamond ring someone dropped while wiping.
Me2
Everyone should google their own phone number from time to time and have any private information removed from the White Pages and other people search engines. I’ve done it and it works.
Zragen77
“Sexual racism is the “sexual rejection of the racial minority, the conscious attempt on the part of the majority to prevent interracial cohabitation”.[1] It is the discrimination between potential sexual or romantic partners on the basis of perceived racial identity. However, not everyone agrees that this should be classified as racism, some argue that distinguishing among partners on the basis of perceived race is not racism at all but a justifiable personal preference.The origins of sexual racism can be explained by looking at its history, especially in the US, where the abolition of slavery and the Reconstruction Era had significant impacts on interracial mixing.” wikipedia.org sexual racism.
Rex Huskey
once shared, you can block telephone numbers but not addresses. always meet in a public place.
Daniel-Reader
Can’t have it both ways on racism. Most gay guys on the planet are Asian. Simple demographics of the human race.Using an Asian guy in the picture for this article makes sense because it’d be racist to use any other racial demographic because they are minorities compared to Asians on Earth.
Invisibleasia
How about a figure with no face on it. Asians are invisible in porn and on mainstream gay site.
nacks27
I have never had any issue finding Asian porn 🙂
Knight
Sadly, female Asians are very represented in porn, since life is very cheap in many parts of SE Asia. Gay porn on the other hand, not so much, and for the very obvious reason. There IS some “specialty” gay porn with Asian guys (Koreans, Thais etc) but typically you don’t see many Asians in mainstream porn.
I know I must sound like a total porn-hound now, but I’m really not– I barely watch it. It’s just been my observation.