Ukrainians turn to encrypted messengers, offline maps and Twitter amid Russian invasion – By Sarah Perez (Techcrunch) / February 28, 2022
Ukrainians have turned to offline mapping and encrypted communication apps in the wake of the Russian invasion of their country, which is displacing millions who have left their homes to either fight back or flee to neighboring countries. According to data from app store intelligence firm Apptopia, over the past several days Ukrainians have been downloading various communication apps, offline maps and more where they can keep up with the latest news and information, like Twitter and streaming radio apps.
Currently, the top five apps in the country’s iOS App Store include the private messenger Signal, messaging app Telegram, Twitter and offline messengers Zello and Bridgefy. Elsewhere in the top 10 is WhatsApp; Maps.Me, an offline maps app that’s now ranking a half dozen spots higher than Google Maps, which has now just pulled its live traffic (info dubbed a security risk); and Starlink’s app from SpaceX — the latter which jumped up 39 spots after Elon Musk announced the satellite internet service was now active in the country. (Of course, to what extent the service is actually viable in the places it’s needed may be reflected in the app’s rank going forward.)
Among the top messaging apps, some saw greater adoption than others.
