Saudi’s viral app Sarahah is going strong and worldwide

Collage: Sarahah logo and its creator Zain al-Abidin Tawfiq

In June, when the anonymous feedback app Sarahah went viral and shot to the No.1 spot among the top free apps in Apple’s App Store, its creator, Zain al-Abidin Tawfiq, was hailed as a maverick. The Saudi programmer had built an app that had beaten the likes of Snapchat and Instagram to the top of the App store.

Sarahah’s success was especially important for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which has been trying to move out of its oil-based economy and focus on technological innovation and entrepreneurship under ambitious reform programmes. But the app was quickly mired in controversy when The Intercept reported in late August that it was quietly uploading users’ contacts to Sarahah’s servers.

Zain rolled up his sleeves and got to work.

“The privacy issue was a challenge for me. I agree that we did not explicitly explain why the app is asking for contacts. It was for a planned ‘find your friends’ feature. It caused technical issues and so we stopped it. My servers are with Microsoft and I can confirm that our servers do not have any contacts,” Zain told My Salaam.

“The pop up asking for uploading contacts has been completely removed in the latest iOS update and we will remove it from Android soon,” Zain added.

After graduating in computer science from King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM), Zain worked as a consultant at the Indian IT firm Wipro. He later joined Saudi Aramco and started developing the app in his spare time, with the help of Badir, a government-backed technology incubator.

When it launched, the website was seen as a helpful tool for employers to gather frank workplace feedback from employees without fear of consequences. The app became a real sensation when it made its way into smartphones. Millennials and teens in the Arab world loved it for letting them say things about people without revealing their identity.

In no time, Sarahah skyrocketed to markets beyond the Arab world without spending a penny on marketing and sales. Traffic began to treble before Zain thought it could even be possible. Just before the app went global, Zain teamed up with Hani Al-Zahrani, who is now his business partner and the Chief Technical Officer of Sarahah.

“The privacy issues reported never affected the app negatively. Besides the US, Canada and the UK, where the app was trending in the beginning, we are now seeing huge traffic from India, Philippines and Indonesia. More than 100 million accounts were created and more than 1 billion messages were sent on Sarahah so far.”

Zain was quick to point out the big names among Sarahah’s fans, including businesses: “A professor from the King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals recently tweeted that he is using Sarahah to communicate with students. Famous businessmen, athletes, musicians and college students have been using Sarahah. Netflix Latin America and Careem Pakistan use it for feedback on their services.”

Sarahah provides a unique link that users can share with friends in any social network. This feature is the mainstay of the app, but it has generated criticism over concerns that the anonymity is encouraging bullying amongst many users.

However, Zain and his team are forging ahead and are already planning features that offer multiple languages and are looking for ways to improve user engagement.  Sarahah is currently only in Arabic and English, but Zain wants to enter several new markets.

“In its first step towards initiating two-way communication and prompting users to write more constructive feedback, Sarahah has introduced a feature that tells the user that the sender has received and liked the comment. Anonymity is the cornerstone of Sarahah, however, and we are continuously thinking of means to improve the experience,” he said.

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