Should dating websites do criminal checks on their clients?

Victims of crime and identity experts say that online dating companies should conduct background checks to keep criminals from using their services.

eHarmony says it does not do criminal record checks of its users because it doesn't want to give clients a false sense of security. (CBC)Carole Markin, a Los Angeles television producer, says she was raped by a man she met on Match.com, North America's biggest online dating company.

"If they had done screening, my case would have been preventable," Markin told CBC News.

Match.com now screens daters against the U.S. National Sex Offender Registry.

The head of Canada's largest background checking company says that while no criminal record check is perfect, Canada has the best in the world.

"If I was CEO of the online dating company and I had a way to make it safer for my customers, or give an avenue for my customers to check ... I'd want to do it," said David Dinesen, head of Checkwell Decision Corp.

However, dating websites are international companies with clients all over the world, living in different jurisdictions with different laws, so conducting a check can be challenging. The companies are worried about liability if criminal get into their services despite their efforts, says the publisher of the Online Dating Insider blog.

"People can always slip through the cracks and I think that's the fear of the big dating sites," said Dave Evans, consultant to online dating companies.

Also, for privacy reasons a company can't just request someone's criminal records.  Instead they would have to do a search of court documents, a time consuming and imperfect process. 

Dinesen said clients could submit their own criminal record checks, however, and limit their pool of daters to people who had done the same.

"I would think that online dating services could sell a wonderful niche product to men or women ... make sure who you are dating is who you are dating, and charge a premium," Dinesen said.

Should dating websites do criminal checks on their clients? Would you submit your criminal background check to a dating company if the people you would meet through the service would do the same? Let us know what you think.



(This survey is not scientific. Results are based on readers' responses.)