Assalamu alaikum everyone,
I want to issue a quick warning about a concerning trend in the app store right now.
There are developers who do not belong to our faith, nor understand it, but are heavily marketing Islamic apps to us because they see the Muslim demographic purely as a goldmine.
A specific example making the rounds right now is an app called "5Locks - Prayer Time App Lock" (also pitched as "DND: Locked for Prayer") by a developer named Luna Bitar.
If you look at her X (Twitter) account, it becomes very clear that this is just a growth hack for her:
• She openly posts about switching to "Arabic-captioned UGC" (User Generated Content) simply to farm engagement and views from our community.
• She treats her prayer app's user base as mere data points for her tech portfolio, boasting about international metrics instead of focusing on any actual spiritual value.
• The biggest red flag regarding her lack of knowledge and care for Islamic values is her previous project. Her very first app, created right before this one, was a pig-themed game called "Partner Pig."
While anyone is legally allowed to code an app, we need to be very careful about who we are trusting with our daily worship, our Quran reading, our data, and our money. These developers spend thousands on targeted ads and use guilt-tripping marketing tactics to get Muslims to subscribe to their paid tiers. They are milking a community they do not even truly respect.
What we should do:
Please double-check the developers behind the religious apps you download. Let us make a conscious effort to support genuine Muslim developers who build these tools out of sincere faith, understanding, and a desire to help our community, rather than opportunists who just see our religion as a trendy market to exploit.
Feel free to share and warn your friends before they pay for subscriptions on apps like these!
TL;DR: The developer behind the "5Locks" prayer app is aggressively marketing to Muslims as a tech growth hack, despite having zero understanding of the religion (her previous app was literally a pig-themed game). Be careful who you give your subscriptions and data to, and support actual Muslim developers instead!