Sarahah

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Here is the new app beating out Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube at the top of the App Store. Probably, most people in the US have never heard of it. The app name Sarahah is used to send and receive feedback from friends and co-workers anonymously.

Sarahah was built by Saudi programmer Zain al-Abidin Tawfiq and named after the Arabic word for frankness or candor launched in early February. BBC reported the app already had 2.5 million users by the end of the month in Egypt, 1.2 million in Saudi Arabia and 1.7 million in Tunisia.

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In the month of June, Sarahah arrived in Apple’s App Store in the last few days. It has skyrocketed to No.1 among the App Store’s top free apps. Are you interested to know how does Sarahah work? and why do its App Store reviews describe it as “a breeding ground for hate”? ‘I don’t recommend going on here unless you wish to be bullied’.

“By receiving honest feedback from your employees and your friends in a private manner,” this app is designed to help you to discover your weaknesses and strengths.

The app itself doesn’t reveal much though it’s tough to tell much from Sarahah’s website. This seems as though Sarahah lets you share your user name with whoever you want. So they can send you anonymous messages. The app recommends attaching a link to your username on Snapchats. You can’t respond to them while you can favorite messages.

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While Sarahah appears in Arabic on the App Store, the text is in English once the app is downloaded to your phone. On Concord, Sarahah has mixed reviews in the App Store with some calling it the perfect app for bullying.

One user posted “My son signed up for an account and within 24 hrs someone posted a horribly racist comment on his page including saying that he should be lynched”. “The site is a breeding ground for hate.” The other wrote, “I don’t recommend going on here unless you wish to be bullied”. The third user posted “Parents, don’t allow your kids to get this app”. “This is an app breeding suicides.”

By the way, Sarahah isn’t the first anonymous messaging app to be accused of threats, bullying, and racism. In 2015, the threats found on the college-focused messaging app Yik Yak prompted a criminal investigation at a college campus. The same year, a college junior was suspended from school for six months after posting a racist comment about black women. Another student was charged with a hate crime for posting “Let’s lynch her” about another student on the app. Yik Yak shut down for good in 2017.

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Bullying starts and ends with the person perpetrating it. No single app can be held responsible for the online harassment. Sarahah is proof that as soon as one anonymous app shuts down and another will pop up in its place. And not everyone using the app experienced bullying or blames the app when harassment occurs.

One user wrote in an App Store review “It’s not a big deal, chill out”. “It’s anonymous, but for the right reasons: so people can say what they want.”

Someone else commented, “I like getting nice messages from my friends and my squad”.

Some other user posted “Definitely boosted my confidence”.

Against anonymous posting and beyond the arguments for, is another glaring issue. Dozens of users reported bugs, glitches, and several other usability issues.

So how has Sarahah gotten so popular, so quickly?

The main reason for Sarahah to get popular soon is that just people can’t resist the allure of learning how people really feel about them.


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