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Original poster

Husband has emails from Match.com

213 replies

CluelesslyCurious · 09/12/2022 19:14

Hi all, have name changed for this one as quite frankly it’s embarrassing! For the sake of this thread I will refer to husband as “DH” although he’s far from that.

Was getting the DC ready for school yesterday when DD handed me DH’s phone. I was reaching to put it on the bedside table and happened to glance down at the screen and see that he had an email from Match.com. Just for context I’ve never looked through his phone or felt the need to. Immediately my heart began to race for reasons that are obvious!

I waited until he had come back from dropping the kids off and confronted him about it. He acted confused and said “I don’t know why would I be on match.com? It’s a spam email.” I told him to pass me his phone so I could see if it was just spam as I feel I was entitled to look to see if what he was saying was true. I typed in “Match.com” in the search bar of his emails so I could scroll through.

There were lots of emails, most of them unopened but they all mentioned him by NAME! For example, Hi , you have two profile views. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I clicked on the link and it did in fact take me to the match.com login page. I told him to login and he claimed there’s nothing for him to login to. I continued to scroll through the emails in an attempt to find a potential email that would show if he had signed up but couldn’t find anything.

May I add whilst I was doing this he was berating me calling me “insecure” and “crazy” although I hadn’t gone fishing for anything nor suspected him of such a thing up until I happened to see the email. I feel I had the right to look as his wife because if I had emails from a dating website I am pretty sure he would have something to say. I felt like I was being gaslighted. As I had somewhere to be I left it at that and as for now he thinks I believe his version of events but I have a horrible feeling in my gut that there is so much more to uncover.

Wise users of Mumsnet please give me some advice! Am I crazy?

OP posts:
MadelineUsher · 09/12/2022 22:36

Feom his response, I think it's possible he signed up (for a free account), perhaps a few months ago, or longer, and forgot about it. But because of him putting the phone on aeroplane mode, it suggests there are other accounts he's on. The old "where there's smoke there's fire". Plus the angry response is a tell.

Aldith · 09/12/2022 22:42

I would absolutely be suspicious OP. My DH and I met on match in December 2015. Once our subscriptions ended we heard from match a few times trying to entice us back. Within 6 months of our subscriptions ended we didn’t hear from them again and after the subscription ended they never told us anyone had looked at our profiles.

As others have said I would register for match and try to find his profile as it says this profile was last looked at….. which will tell you when he was last online.

BT11 · 09/12/2022 22:45

If you do have a look at the phone try to check the 'cache & cookies' in the advanced section of his history browsing. Also do this on a shared computer if you have one. Even if you delete your search history doing that will show how many times a site has been visited or how much data has been used looking at those websites. You have to clear the cookies etc separately - which he may or may not have done.

If nothing comes up then hopefully he hasn't been using the website 🤞. You can always look up match.com on playstore/apple store and it will usually show an icon to say if the app has previously been downloaded and deleted. Or there is a way to check what apps have been downloaded then deleted in the app store settings (depending on what phone)🤷🏻‍♀️

Of course I don't condone doing it - but if you do check those spots out. It may put your mind at ease if nothing comes up.

Gh12345 · 09/12/2022 22:48

I’m honestly a little shocked at some of the responses here. Seriously he must be cheating because he put his phone on airplane mode? I do that often and someone who is cheating isn’t going to give you their phone with the ‘unopened’ emails there.

Justanotherlurker · 09/12/2022 22:51

CluelesslyCurious · 09/12/2022 22:30

But the email from match.com didn’t use the name from his email. Say his name on his email address is “[email protected]” and then the name match.com used is “Danny Smith”

Show quote history

It really isn't difficult to get this info, he could have signed up to any gofundme/change.org/newlsetter/forum site as Danny Smith with the same email address.

FirstName, Lastname, email is common fields that can bought for pennys on referral, it doesn't even need to be some nefarious site.

It is most likely an email being sold as data if it is hitting spam as it is that your DH is looking for an affair and his emails are hitting spam unread.

I am just speaking from technical terms here.

Onnabugeisha · 09/12/2022 22:53

The aeroplane mode thing is also dodgy because he claimed he did that so no one would disturb him but surely you can just put your phone on silent?

I use aeroplane mode all the time to not be disturbed. Silent mode still vibrates and lights up with notification banners. Airplane mode gives me a break from all of that. How is it “dodgy”?

MyTabbyCats · 09/12/2022 22:53

i don’t know about the results but one thing I can say for sure is the uneasy feeling you have was exactly what I had a few months before my ex said he was leaving. At the time it seemed to come out of the blue but with hindsight I remembered those strange, few occasions of just feeling that something was off. I since came to realise this was my gut instinct but I dismissed it because my ex is a good man I could never have believed would be he capable of an affair.

AintNobodyHereButUsChickens · 09/12/2022 22:54

It COULD just be spam. I suddenly started getting match.com spam on my actual wedding day and then an email every Saturday afterwards, like clockwork it was until I managed to stop it!

Afreshstar · 09/12/2022 23:02

CluelesslyCurious · 09/12/2022 19:27

The thing is, the fact it was “match.com” threw me off the most. I could have understood if it was as you said, tinder or bumble as that seems more relevant to the times.

Show quote history

I’m in my 30s and recently joined OLD and the main one I use is match.com as I wasn’t keen on tinder although I do have bumble downloaded. So it very much is still a thing! I doubt he would have joined before you met if you were teens when you got together so it seems very clear that these are notification emails since he has an account. What other explanation is there or am I missing something?

goldfishthecracker · 09/12/2022 23:06

Sign up for tinder in a fake name and put your location as home, near his work, near his parents house and also try somewhere that you both used to date. Use a different throwaway email address.

If he's on there you'll find him.

MadelineUsher · 09/12/2022 23:07

Gh12345 · 09/12/2022 22:48

I’m honestly a little shocked at some of the responses here. Seriously he must be cheating because he put his phone on airplane mode? I do that often and someone who is cheating isn’t going to give you their phone with the ‘unopened’ emails there.

It's dodgy because (1) it's a new thing, and (2) plus emails from match.com about his matches, and (3) because he got angry rather than mystified when OP approached him about the emails from match. It's a combo-deal.

Onnabugeisha · 09/12/2022 23:18

MadelineUsher · 09/12/2022 23:07

It's dodgy because (1) it's a new thing, and (2) plus emails from match.com about his matches, and (3) because he got angry rather than mystified when OP approached him about the emails from match. It's a combo-deal.

Show quote history

#3 isn’t accurate, he was initially confused. It was only when the OP decided this was an “act” and demanded his phone so she could “see if it was true” that he got angry. I would have gotten angry too.

MadelineUsher · 09/12/2022 23:21

Yeah, well. In my experience, after the fact, it is clear that everyone who ever did me dirty got angry when confronted or questioned, however my manner was at the time.

MadelineUsher · 09/12/2022 23:24

Also if he was seriously confused, bemused, and bewildered - innocent, ie - he would remain so until the mystery was solved. Speaking from experience. The worst offenders were all baffled, absolutely baffled, before the shouting and turning it on me began. Happy days.

hellycat · 09/12/2022 23:28

Sounds like you have been together since you were very young and are each other's first and perhaps only serious partner? Sorry to say it, but I think that sounds like classic cheating territory - he feels he has some sort of entitlement to sexual variety and variation, and is feeling 'trapped', ie, by having to be faithful to you and honour your marriage vows, when the world is telling him that real men have exciting and adventurous sex lives with dozens of women.

Sorry OP, and the barefaced lying is entirely typical of many men too.

Holidayhomehell · 09/12/2022 23:28

Ordinarily I would say he is being dishonest.

BUT a few years back I kept getting emails of a similar nature from a dating site - telling me I had new messages…when I clicked on them it had an account and profile picture!! I have never done on line dating in my life. The profile picture was in fact my Facebook profile pic so I think something happened via Facebook.

It wasn’t a site like match.com though - so probably unlikely to be the same situation. But I did want to share it as I 100% did not sign up. Yet I had a profile and messages.

ThisIsNotThePostYourLookingFor · 09/12/2022 23:34

I sometimes get spam emails from plenty of fish using my first name and I have never been in that site! It could honestly be junk but as others suggest see if it sends a new password email to his account

failedmydog · 09/12/2022 23:36

Just keep any eye out for a lack or totally drop in phone use.

What most people do when spooked on a phone is to keep the main phone and then go and grab a new one and hide it to avoid what you did (ie looking) from happening again.

You'll find in the next week or so he may well happily hand over his blanked current phone to reassure you.

Otherwise maybe it's just spam. But his reaction makes me think not!

SheSaidHummingbird · 09/12/2022 23:39

He will have deleted all and any evidence. You confronting him will have spooked him so he'll be extra careful and vigilant for a while... Check his phone again in a few months when his guard is down.

Retz1212 · 09/12/2022 23:43

I got lots of spam from match.com and I'm not even sure I ever signed up. I never looked into it though and just put it all in a junkbox.

mathanxiety · 09/12/2022 23:50

I suspect he will become very possessive about his phone for the next while.

kateandme · 09/12/2022 23:56

I've had them use my name! Never been on it.
"Kate we have 3 matches for you to see"
Seriously freaked me the hell out. But they used my name.so there could be another side to this ok be careful.

shakeittilyoumakeit · 09/12/2022 23:57

Genuinely Spam emails are usually very crude.
Lots of emojis, weird spelling, weird fonts, text layouts, email addresses that look dodgy.

I suspect he's signed up to have a look around at the very least, while I guess isn't ideal, and possibly more.
I think I heard recently that 70-80 of the men on dating apps are married/in a LTR. So it's not beyond imagination your H might be one of them.

The angry response is pretty much him admitting it if you just asked him in a neutral calm way.

ginandvomit · 09/12/2022 23:59

Do you have joint bank accounts? Check monthly subscriptions (I assume that's how they charge?).

Divebar2021 · 10/12/2022 00:02

I don’t really have any expertise to add about Match but if I was a married person looking for an extra marital affair I sure as hell wouldn’t use my main email account; I’d set up an account just for that, I wouldn’t have this account logged in and I wouldn’t use my real name.