Ashley Madison Sees Huge Rise in Membership

Ashley Madison has built their business model on infidelity, and apparently business is good! The online service prides itself on helping its curious members find a like-minded individual with the goal of having a discreet affair. The cheating matchmaker (cheatmaker?) is reporting record enrollment numbers, and has even disclosed the top 20 cities where the sinful hookups are happening.

The "global leader for affairs" is not only seeing its membership swelling in general, but more specifically - more women than ever are signing up! USA Today reports that female users now account for more than half of the 54 million users currently attempting a secret hook-up through the site.

According to Ashley Madison's data, these are the top 20 cities for cheaters:

Seattle
Denver
Dallas
Philadelphia
San Jose
Los Angeles
San Francisco
Houston
Charlotte
Austin
Columbus
Indianapolis
Chicago
San Diego
New York City
Jacksonville
San Antonio
Washington DC
Fort Worth
Phoenix

The company nearly folded in 2015 after two major scandals revealed some pretty shady business practices. The first was a massive data breach that exposed 36 million members' personal data, which is really bad when you are keeping secret information about your cheating users. That snafu revealed the second bombshell: Ashley Madison had been using chat bots masquerading as women in order to get and keep more men on the site. Since then, the company has paid a $1.6 million settlement and hired firm Ernst & Young to verify its 2017 data. They have confirmed that all of the current users are human.