Photo verification is definitely not just a marketing gimmick - it is actually one of the most practical security layers we have right now. It does not guarantee that a person will be your soulmate, but it completely eliminates the classic catfish who uses photos of fitness models or celebrities. Knowing that the face on the screen matches the person holding the phone gives you baseline peace of mind. I started filtering exclusively for verified accounts after reading about the security features on Hily , and my overall experience improved significantly. You get far fewer dead-end conversations and almost zero fake profiles. Obviously, you still need to follow basic common sense and watch how people behave in the chat, but verification filters out a massive chunk of bad actors before you even exchange a single word.