Dating apps can do a lot of things: connect you with singles you might not otherwise meet. Help you get to know a potential date before you meet in person. Even help you find your “soul mate”. One thing they can’t do: use AI to determine if someone you’re chatting with has an STI.

Via Gizmodo:

A dating app that claimed it could use artificial intelligence to screen potential mates for “sexual health” problems (i.e., STDs) has been shut down after the Federal Trade Commission caught wind of the company’s dubious claims.

A company called HeHealth previously promoted what it called an “AI-powered sexually transmitted infection (‘STI’) detection application,” the likes of which hilariously asked male users to send in dick pics so that they could be screened for social diseases. The app, dubbed Calmara, would then use the magic of AI to assess whether the male member was healthy. HeHealth claimed that Calmara could detect as many as 10 different sexually transmitted diseases with up to 94% accuracy and, on its website, the company described its application as a “1 min AI-Powered Penis Health Checker.”

As you can imagine, there were problems with Calmara. For one thing, most STDs are invisible to the naked eye. For another thing, the app doesn’t appear to have worked very well. Indeed, a previous investigation by the Los Angeles Times found that the app “struggled to distinguish between inanimate objects and human genitals, issuing a cheery ‘Clear!’ to images of both a novelty penis-shaped vase and a penis-shaped cake.” Yeah, that’s not great.

The FTC subsequently forced HeHealth to shut down Calmara and delete all customer data that had been obtained through it. 

Nice try, I guess? Stick to OBC.