Say hi to Sarahah, the anonymous messaging app ruining Snapchat for teens

You might not have heard of it, but Sarahah's a new anonymous messaging app blowing up right now. And it all's because of Snapchat's most recent update.

Not only that, but Sarahah's meteoric rise in popularity has also created a trend on Snapchat—much to the annoyance of countless teens.

Snapchat's most recent update gave users the ability to post links in their snaps. Since then, Sarahah catapulted to the number one position in the App Store, beating the likes of Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, and other major social networks.

Sarahah works by giving each of its users a custom URL. That URL then directs whoever clicks on it to that user's page. And on the page of that user (who, let's say, is you) anyone with the URL can leave messages exclusively about a topic of interest to most people: you.

And that's where Snapchat comes in: people are using Snapchat's new link attachment feature to upload screenshots of Sarahah messages they've received, and attaching a link to their Sarahah page.

Problem is: Snapchatters are already hugely irritated by the glut of Sarahah screenshots in their mates' Stories.

Francie Shaffer, 21, from Colorado, says she thinks it's "annoying" that people are posting screenshots. "When people first started using it, 99% of people's stories were the screenshots 'lol,'" says Shaffer. For Shaffer, Snapchat isn't completely ruined, but it's irritating that "every other person keeps posting the link to their Sarahah even if they've already posted it 4 other times that day."

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Matt Kelly, 16, from Laois, Ireland, says people are also posting screenshots of the negative comments they receive on Sarahah. He says it's "super annoying" because people are "looking for someone to say something controversial so they could screenshot it" and put it on their Story. "It makes people's Stories really long and then they're giving out when someone says something hurtful," says Kelly.

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Nineteen-year-old Malijah Rubin from Louisiana is completely exasperated with the constant screenshots of Sarahah. "Sarahah wouldn't be so annoying if people would just posted the link and went on with their day, but no, they want to post EVERY little comment they get for the world to see," says Rubin. She says that for the past few weeks, her Snapchat has been "blown up" with Sarahah screenshots which make her "believe the whole app is annoying."

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Dylan Miller, 19, from Georgia, U.S., says that every time he logs onto Snapchat there's a "90 percent chance" he sees someone posting something about Sarahah and asking people to leave them a message.

He says he's trying not to let things like that get to him, but he's finding it "kind of annoying" seeing that "3 to 4 times on my feed" instead of "stories that involve something interesting and have depth." Miller thinks it's just "another trend" that will eventually pass, which is why he's not letting it get to him.

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So, what do teens make of Sarahah in general? Shaffer reckons the app is a "spinoff of ask.fm," the anonymous messaging platform, which was popular when she was in middle school. "It's just a way for people to be able to expose their true feelings towards someone—whether it be negative or positive," says Shaffer.

Rubin says that Sarahah is "nothing more than Ask.fm with a different name." That's not exactly a compliment, given ask.fm's reputation as a platform for cyberbullying.

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Miller's own experience of ask.fm during middle school has made him reluctant to embrace anonymous messaging apps such as this. "I saw many hurtful comments and cowardly people writing degrading things behind a keyboard as if it was a way to get off," says Miller. "I feel if you wouldn’t say something to someone’s face you shouldn’t send it anonymously online for the person to see."

Given the lack of success of similar anonymous messaging apps like Yik Yak, Secret, Whisper, and ask.fm, Miller could well be right about Sarahah being a passing phase. Once the novelty wears off, teens' Snapchat feeds might one day return to normalcy. But, for now, they may just have to weather the storm.