Baltimore On List Of Safest, Most Dangerous Cities For Online Dating

While caution should be exercised when meeting or chatting with someone new in person and online, singles in some cities should be more cautious than others, researchers say.

San Antonio is the safest city in the nation for online dating, according to a new study, which ranks Baltimore among those a bit more dangerous.

Home security company SafeWise and consumer research firm HighSpeedInternet.com compiled the list of 56 cities to see where they rank in terms of how safe they are for online dating. Analysts from both groups teamed up to overlay the most recent FBI crime data along with state-by-state sexually transmitted disease (STD) rates from the Centers for Disease Control from 2015 in the reckoning.

"The correlations led us to draw interesting conclusions about the dangers of online dating in certain geographic areas and cities," researchers wrote.

San Antonio came out on top as the safest city for online dating, with a score of 9.4 out of 10. New York City was second, with Portland, Oregon; San Jose, California; and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, rounding out the top five.

Baltimore came in at No. 37, with a safety score of 6.52:

• Total STD cases (per 100,000 people): 2,926
• Violent crimes (per 100,000 people): 562
• Total STD cases + violent crimes (per 100,000 people): 3,488
• Safety score: 6.52

The least safe city for online dating, according to the study, was Buffalo, New York, which had a safety score of 0.8.

A high rate of STDs contributed to these being among the least safe cities for online dating:

1. Buffalo, New York
2. Riverside, California
3. Knoxville, Tennessee
4. Orlando, Florida
5. Detroit, Michigan

To determine a safety score, researchers at HighSpeedInternet.com and SafeWise.com analyzed a year’s worth of STD and violent crime data, then adjusted it for population.

To see the full rankings, click here.

— By Tony Cantu (Patch Staff) and Elizabeth Janney

Image via Shutterstock.