The owner and operator of dating apps such as Tinder, OK Cupid and Plenty of Fish, Match.com, has called for a “demarcation” between public and private content. The firm argues that while publicly available material online should be subject to a new regulator, private content should not.

Match.com made its proposals as a part of a public consultation on plans the communication minister, Richard Bruton, to regulate harmful content online. Bruton believes social media companies such as Facebook need more oversight and wants to introduce an online safety commissioner to oversee the new system.

The company is concerned that its dating apps will face the same regulations as social media platforms such as Facebook and argues that since its apps are “closed networks, strictly geared towards adults-only” it should not be subject to the same regulations. #

This, Match.com argues, is due to the content of its various platforms, which is largely private, peer-to-peer messaging and “generally not available for public consumption.”

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Furthermore, its business model relies on subscriptions rather than monetising users’ data through targeted advertising the way social media platforms do. “We only collect the data we need in order to provide the best service possible. We have made a global and company-wide commitment not to sell or share our users’ data to third parties for commercial purposes,” it said.

“We, therefore, suggest that a one size fits all approach, which does not recognise the diversity of platforms and business models, is likely to struggle in enacting its mandate – and could skew the market in favour of larger platforms, which have the resources to deal with complex or unwieldy legislation.”

Google, which owns video platform YouTube, has also raised concerns over the lack of demarcation by the department between users and companies that create content. “While an adequate level of protection for users – particularly children – must be guaranteed, this could create excessive burdens for individual creators and indeed a significant burden for regulators,” it said.

The tech giant says that sanctions and fines should be “limited to the most serious, repeated and systemic cases of structural non-compliance rather than single instances of non-compliance”. People should contact the company before the regulator, or the regulator would be flooded “with an unmanageable volume of requests”, it added.

“Without sufficient and clear protection from liability, many platforms, particularly those who are just starting up, may be forced to take the path of least resistance and delete content irrespective of whether it is obviously unlawful or not,” Google said in its submission.

“Google believes such an approach is not appropriate, as it fails to attempt any meaningful balancing of the important fundamental rights at issue”.

Previously, YouTube has been criticised for not doing enough to remove videos on its platform proliferating racist, homophobic and extreme content. However, the company countered these accusations saying it was attempting to strike a balance with concern in regards to freedom of expression.