At last! An app that tells you if you're about to hook up with your cousin

With a sparse population of just 320,000 inhabitants, Iceland has a new service that tells you if the sexy stranger you're flirting with is actually a relative

Bump your phone with someone too closely related and an alarm will go off.
(Image credit: Google play)

Reykjavík, the most densely populated city in Iceland, only has about 120,000 inhabitants, and is famous for harboring a pretty sweet bar scene. Now, unlike the rest of Europe, Reykjavík isn't exactly bursting with big nightclubs pulsing with revelers. Rather, the town that birthed Björk is better known for its crammed, kitschy watering holes, which hip party-goers only head for after 12 or 1 a.m.

But with a tiny population — Iceland itself only has about 320,000 people, or about half of Washington, D.C. — the hookup scene can get a bit… well, tricky. While Iceland is known for embracing its latent weirdness, drunkenly embracing a maybe-cousin is still an obvious no-no.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Chris Gayomali is the science and technology editor for TheWeek.com. Previously, he was a tech reporter at TIME. His work has also appeared in Men's Journal, Esquire, and The Atlantic, among other places. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.