A controversial new Facebook app shows users of the social network which of their online friends are prepared to meet up for no-strings attached sexual encounters.
Bang With Friends claims to help users ‘anonymously find friends who are down for the night’ by pairing up any that are both attracted to each other.
However, doubt has been cast over how anonymous the app really is, since it has an apparent loophole which shows prospective users which of their friends are already using it before signing up.
Logging into the app shows a screen filled with the profile pictures of your Facebook friends of the opposite sex – it appears to be designed exclusively for heterosexual pairings.
Beneath each of the profiles listed sits a button labelled ‘Down to Bang’ which users can click to indicate that they are sexually interested in the friend in question.
Clicking the button switches its label to ‘Awaiting Bang’ but will not notify them of your interest. Unless, that is, they are also users of the app and have also clicked the button beneath your face too.
If that happens, then the app will send a notification email to the address listed on your Facebook account informing you that you have a match.
However, despite its promises of anonymity, the app appears to have a serious glitch that could cause serious problems for users who prefer discretion.
Like other Facebook apps, when users sign up to the service it shows a screen asking them if they are sure, but also showing which of their friends are already using the app.
For many users, the revelation that they are out trawling for sex over Facebook could be the source of serious embarrassment.
A second glitch seems to be that once users have indicated they are ‘Down to Bang’ a friend, there appears to be no way to revoke it – the button no longer works once it has switched to ‘Awaiting Bang’.
Buzzfeed writer Katie Heaney described the idea behind the app as ‘icky’.
‘Unless you’re someone who believes (almost certainly wrongly, by the way) that your Facebook friends are all dying to hook up with you, and would do so if only given the bright blue button to admit it, the app doesn’t really offer you anything you couldn’t already accomplish on Facebook without it,’ she wrote.
‘How many people would really freely admit to wanting to hook up with a friend who wouldn’t already have some indicator of interest? Shouldn’t you already kind of know your chances with your Facebook friends?
‘Part of the grossness of “Bang With Friends” is the way it conceives of friendship as something you only do to get to, well, banging.’
At the time of writing, around 2,500 people had signed up to use the new app.
MailOnline contacted the developers for comment, but has as yet received no response.
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