There are a few services available today that allow people to share their thoughts anonymously.  Despite their bleak numbers, interest in these apps or services is growing as more people want to protect their identity, or don’t want their social lives to be tied to their work lives.

Unfortunately, these secretive apps are not totally anonymous, as they require some personal information to use the service.  This means everything you share can still be tied to your name, and potentially put you in hot water.

A group of engineers who refused to be identified is developing an app that they promise will be totally anonymous.

The app is dubbed Cloaq (pronounced “cloak”), and will not ask people for their email addresses or phone numbers to sign up for the service.  Instead, they will be assigned an @id number, and the user will only need to provide a password to secure the account.

“So, even if there is a hack… there is no personal information to retrieve,” explains a Cloaq co-founder. “That’s my only beef with Secret. It’s really fun to use and consume micro-content on, but I still won’t post anything that I wouldn’t want coming back to me, because they have my personal information.”

The security angle

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Cloaq works like other anonymous social apps in that users can follow you, you can follow other users, add a title to posts, attach photos, favorite posts, flag posts and view popular posts, among other things.  Users also have the option to post long or short entries, so the service is not limiting people’s ability to express themselves.

The @id numbers will start at @alpha1 and go through @alpha9999 before jumping to the next letter of the alphabet.  If a user forgets the password, there are security questions to help them access their account again.  But if a user forgets his @id number, there’s no getting that account back.

Team Cloaq will be enforcing a strict policy regarding abuse.  Accounts that make racist, prejudice hate speeches or threats will be immediately frozen.

No exact date was given as to when Cloaq will be available, but the team stated that a demo will be coming out in a few weeks which will be available for both mobile and web, but will initially be available for iOS.

How anonymous are these apps?

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For one, we all know that Secret is not entirely anonymous since it requires some personal information from users. Whisper uses a device’s unique ID, and Cloaq promises to use @id numbers. But are Whisper and Cloaq’s privacy measure enough to keep people’s identity a secret?

In 2012, there were reports that hackers got their hands on millions of Apple unique device identifiers, or UDIDs. It was concerning, but not many were even aware of what a UDID is.

A UDID is usually the serial number of your phone, which means no UDID is the same. Previously, this number was used by developers to track the activities of your device, like the sites you visit, apps you use, or store information about the device. Advertising companies can also use the UDID to cross-reference which apps you use so they can deliver targeted ads.

Apps that use UDID stores different types of information from contact info, notification settings, or in Whisper’s case, use it as a login. The question now is, can a UDID be used to identify a person?

Yes, but that would require access to all the databases of all of the apps a person is using to get usernames, email addresses, histories, friends, and habits tied to your mobile usage. It’s a daunting task, but if one wants to do it, it can be done.

• Going the extra mile?

Though Cloaq’s promise of anonymity through an assigned email address is enticing, it’s overall service is quite similar to Secret and Whisper.  The security angle could be what makes Cloaq stand out, though questions remain as to whether or not a device ID can still be accessed through the use of Cloaq’s app.

As we wait for Cloaq to finally reveal itself, if you’re not yet using an anonymous social app, but want to, here are some apps you can now try.

3 anonymous social apps

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Secret – Speak Freely

This app allows you to share anything with your friends anonymously, as it requires no profiles or names.  Secret is a place for people to be honest, share hilarious stuff about people they know without having to own up to the confession.

You can create posts and make things interesting by adding photos or color backdrops.  Discover popular secrets and share them with your friends on Secret, Facebook, Twitter, email or via text.  If your secret catches the attention of your friends and they share it with others, your secret can travel around the world.  Whenever you share a secret or talk to your friends on the service, a new avatar is assigned to the user so your identity is kept hidden.

The only downside is, users need to provide their email address and phone number to use the service, so it’s not totally anonymous.  There’s a chance that everything you share can be pinned back to you.  The app is currently only available for iOS.

Whisper

Whisper app on the iPhone

Whisper is available for both iOS and Android, and promises complete anonymity as it doesn’t ask users for their personal information.  The app uses your device’s unique ID to identify a user, which means the service knows less about a user than if it were to require a phone number or email address.

Once a Whisper account is created on your device, the service will always recognize the original account, which means users can’t create multiple Whisper accounts on one device, since the device’s unique ID doesn’t change.  You can change your username and password any time you please just by going to the settings section of the app.

You can search topics but not usernames, and the topics are sorted into the latest Whispers posted, popular posts, featured, and those created by people near you.  You can send a personal message by just tapping on a Whisper, reply to Whispers, “heart” them, share Whispers, and invite your friends to use the service.  You can make your Whispers standout with photos and quirky fonts.

Banter

Banter is touted as the world’s first anonymous chat network that connects people through conversations.  The app launched recently on iOS and Android, and requires no personal information to use the service, which means you can chat with anyone anonymously.

The service is similar to mIRC, which was quite popular in the 90s to early 2000s, but for mobile, so you can chat with people either based on similar interests or your location, anonymously.  You can create your own public or private chat rooms, join chat rooms, chat with people near you, and you can even keep track of multiple chats at any given time.  Banter features a wide range of topics, the ability to send private messages, add full screen photos, and also organize chats and interactions via your profile.

Banter also makes it easy to jump from one chat room to another by simply tapping on the room the use is currently in.  A module will appear which will allow them browse similar topics, change channels, or jump to another room.

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