The owner of video chat app Houseparty has claimed that a commercial rival is engaging in a smear campaign and has put up a £1 million bounty for proof.

This follows several days of internet rumours and social media posts claiming that downloading the app caused other services, such as Netflix and Spotify, to have data personal data breached.

Epic Games, which bought Houseparty last year, responded that there was “no evidence” to back up those claims, which came after Houseparty became one of the most downloaded apps in the world, due to national lockdowns enacted to slow the spread of the Coronavirus.

Two million people downloaded the app per week in during March - compared to just 130,000 downloads during the same period last month.

The BBC reported that Epic Games did not state why it believes Houseparty was the victim of a smear attack, but promised to pay the first person to provide evidence of this.

A statement from the company explained: “We’ve found no evidence to suggest a link between Houseparty and the compromises of other unrelated accounts.

“As a general rule, we suggest all users choose strong passwords when creating online accounts on any platform,” the spokesperson said, adding: “We are investigating indications that the recent hacking rumours were spread by a paid commercial smear campaign to harm Houseparty."

Commenting on the issue, Christoph Hebeisen, director of security intelligence research at Lookout, said that there are two separate issues being discussed around Houseparty. First, it appears that many users are not aware of the privacy implications of how the app works and how people can 'drop-in' when they don't want or expect them to - which can lead to awkward situations.

"The second issue is the assertion that third-party accounts are being hacked through the Houseparty app," he continued. "These claims cover a wide variety of third-party services such as music and video streaming services as well as financial services - while there are numerous reports from users online we did not find any evidence to indicate that the Houseparty app as available from official app stores is to blame for compromises they are experiencing."

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