Recent
news feed of my Facebook is flooded with Sarahah messages. Some are
really hilarious and I actually had a good laugh reading them. Some are
admissions of love from secret admirers of the recipient. At first, I
was not getting anything out of these posts, as I was not familiar with
the app. Then I googled about it and found that it's a new anonymous
messaging app. Noticing it's popularity, I also opened downloaded the
app from playstore and created an account, just for the sake of fun.
Though the messages I received through this app are few in number. I may
be a bit too old for this kind of frivolous activities. Whatever, after
a few days, I saw some posts in Facebook relating to the dubious nature
of the app, claiming the app not to be safe at all.
Now I have a few questions to you all, after reading about all the controversies relating to this app:
1. The app is originally from Saudi Arabia, even the letters Sarahah
written in this app are in Arabic language. We all know that. Found out
by googling that it used to exist as a website created by the Saudi
Arabian developer Zain al-Abidin Tawfiq. It had the purpose of allowing
employees to post anonymous feedback to their employers. It gave a voice
to those who had something to say, but never spoke up for fears that
they could be fired. The app is just an application of this concept on a
personal level, with friends and acquaintances anonymously giving
feedback to each other.
So, whats wrong here? Is it the fact that
it originated in Saudi Arabia, instead of a Western country? Facebook
and Whatsapp, perhaps the most popular apps used, owe their origin to
USA. Though there have been many instances of fake profiles/ hacking in
FB, still we continue using them. My own FB account was hacked twice,
though the issue got resolved after reporting phishing to FB.
2.
The Sarahah app can access all your personal information in your phone,
read in a certain FB. But then, what information have your Facebook app
access to? Well, the list goes like this:
Device & app history,
Identity, Calender, Contacts, Location, SMS, Photos/Media/Files, Camera,
Microphone, Wi-fi connection information, Device ID & call
information, Other (don't know what is included in this "other").
We
give FB permission to access all these at the time of download. Give it
a thought. Does an app really need all these information?
3.
Uninstalling the Sarahah app does not eliminate your account created in
the app, this was also mentioned in that certain FB post about Sarahah.
Is it not true about any other app? How can you remove your account from
an app by merely uninstalling an app?
4. Lastly, there is the
most serious allegation against Sarahah, that of cyberbullying. Though
the app urges users to post constructive feedback, the anonymous nature
of messaging through the app makes it easier to bully someone. But
wasn't there bullying in the pre-smart phone era? In the 90's, when
there were no smart phones, we had landline telephones. People used to
call anonymously others, without the fear of getting recognised, as
there was not any way to detect from which number the call is coming. We
had anonymous love-letters, before the age of anonymous Sarahah
messages. This is not a new concept. Only the coming of technology has
made anomymous messaging easier than ever.
So, please apply your own intelligence and common sense before coming to any conclusion.
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