On November 9–10, 2026, Victoria's Labor government announced a package of family-violence pledges ahead of the state election on November 28. One of them would make it a criminal offence for people convicted of family violence or sexual offences to use dating apps. Premier Ben Carroll also promised a "Clare's Law" disclosure scheme, under which people can ask police whether a partner has a history of domestic violence, and police can warn someone at risk proactively. Labor says the scheme would be modelled on South Australia's, which has run since 2018. The package also includes $31.5 million for the family-violence sector, a power for coroners to stop abusers acting as next of kin to their victims, and an expanded ban on AI smart glasses in pools, change rooms, community sport venues, hospitals, aged care and family-violence services.

Why It Matters

Governments are moving from asking dating apps to moderate to having the state decide who may use them. If Victoria's Labor wins and legislates, Tinder, Hinge, Bumble, Grindr and kink-forward apps such as Feeld would face a direct question: will they verify identity against offender registries to keep banned users off? That would move dating apps toward the ID-based age and identity checks already reshaping adult content. It follows the US [Romance Scam Prevention Act](/stories/romance-scam-prevention-act-dating-apps) and [Match's crackdown on AI agents](/stories/match-group-bans-ai-dating-agents) as another sign that "who is really on the other side of the swipe" is becoming a regulatory issue. This is a campaign promise for now, so watch the November 28 result.

"You deserve to know if your partner has a secret violent past," Carroll said. Clare's Law is no longer a partisan issue in Victoria: Opposition Leader Jess Wilson promised a domestic-violence disclosure scheme in July. The dating-app offence is the newer idea. The Age reports that family-violence groups and experts welcomed the extra funding but questioned how the government could actually implement the disclosure scheme and the app ban.

That question matters. As described in the announcement coverage, the offence would apply to the offender, not the platform. Enforcing it would depend on either catching banned users after the fact or having apps check users against conviction records, which would raise obvious privacy and data-sharing questions. Neither The Age nor the ABC reported any detail on how the ban would be policed.

Sources

Update — 2026-11-12

Initial entry — story first created.