UpScrolled and the rise of ethical Muslim tech in a censored digital world

As censorship of the Gaza genocide intensified, UpScrolled has emerged as a Muslim-led alternative to Big Tech platforms, challenging digital suppression and reclaiming ethical tech.

By HASANAIN ABDULLAH

As censorship surrounding Gaza reached a peak, a new platform called UpScrolled was launched. It arrived as a direct response to the suppression of voices on Meta, YouTube and TikTok. Defined as an alternative to Meta’s Instagram and TikTok, the social media application was released in July 2025 by Australian-based tech innovator Issam Hijazi.

This development raises the question: are we witnessing the dawn of a renaissance in the Muslim tech world, one centred on digital sovereignty and ethical design?

The Chinese-based founding company of TikTok, ByteDance, was recently acquired by a US-backed group that has banned users from reporting on the atrocities taking place in Palestine. It has banned keywords such as ‘Zionist’ and any terms viewed as inflammatory for Western-aligned countries.

During times of war, truth is one of the casualties, and a partial narrative is often presented to the world. News agencies, including CNN and Fox, are used as media apparatuses during conflict. In the pre-social media era, CNN live-televised the invasion of Iraq during Desert Storm. The programming was well planned and deliberate. The visuals of F-16 fighter jets taking off from carriers were of a high production value. Audiences were glued to their television screens as events unfolded.

The case of Gaza-based journalist Bisan Owda became a global symbol of this struggle. With over a million followers, her TikTok account was a vital conduit for real-time testimony, showing the world the daily reality of deprivation and bombardment. When her account was banned, it severed a crucial lifeline of truth. While it was later reinstated after public outcry, her ordeal highlighted the fragility of journalistic reach on platforms where users are treated as data commodities rather than rights-bearing individuals. For a global public, and particularly for Muslims and allies, it exposed a painful truth: the digital public square is policed, and the arbiters of access are seldom neutral.

Consumers increasingly receive news on the go. A short social media clip of a breaking news event is shared across community-based or niche-interest WhatsApp groups. When journalists’ social media accounts are banned or taken down, this poses a serious problem. It exposes tech companies and reveals which side of a war they are effectively assuming.

During times of war, truth is suppressed and objectivity is thrown out of the window. This was evident during the 1980s under apartheid, when journalists faced detention and their material was confiscated.

For South Africans who grew up before democracy, the reality of a police state’s media censorship is all too familiar. The SABC acted as a filter through which news was reviewed and curated to suit a particular narrative. Key stories about police death squads and the killing of activists were censored. Media outlets, including Grassroots, Muslim News and Saamstaan, amongst others, were banned due to their reporting on atrocities taking place on the ground. During times of war, a duel plays out on the media front: perceptions are shaped, minds are won through propaganda, and those who control the narrative prevail.

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There is newfound hope that developments on the media front may improve for the underclass, and this comes in the form of UpScrolled, an application that took a year and six months to build. The code for the platform was written while the genocide was unfolding. During that time, Hijazi lost 50 close family members due to bombardments. UpScrolled was born out of the need for an alternative means to get the news out after witnessing censorship and the banning of creators’ news feeds.

The founder, Issam Hijazi, a Jordanian-born Palestinian tech innovator, was formerly employed by IBM, Oracle and Hitachi. Supported by Tech for Palestine, based in Australia, the application has a core group of developers and a contributing team of volunteer developers who offered their skills to the project.

The app aims to give users the opportunity to publish social media posts and stories without facing censorship. Built with integrity and ethics, it avoids manipulating users who consume the platform. Users and creators are viewed with respect and not merely as commodities. Given the quantum leap witnessed globally, tech now affects every facet of life. It has become clear that technology offers solutions to both business and social needs across the world.

During the opening address at the Web Summit Qatar 2026 in Doha, Hijazi made a thought-provoking statement on how tech companies conduct business. He said: ‘Big Tech has provided technology for certain regimes to enable wars in Gaza. They do not care about the welfare of their users. Driven by profit, they design technology to keep users addicted.’ This reinforces the notion that many modern tech companies are not built with ethics at their core. This poses a problem in a society that relies on technology for education, social interaction and business. Tech innovators should not view users as commodities; they should adopt adab when building technology.

With the growing popularity of UpScrolled, the issue of tech sovereignty comes to the fore. Moulana Sulaimaan Ravat, during his keynote address at the Ummah Tech Conference in Cape Town in 2025, stated that ‘we as Muslims do not have control of the narrative as media platforms are owned by Western interests who control the narrative’. As a theologian and media journalist, he experienced censorship when his WhatsApp profile was banned. His argument was that Muslim societies do not own major tech companies that influence communication platforms.

Similarly, media-savvy and tech-centric Moulana Irshaad Sedick had his YouTube platform, which served primarily theological purposes, taken down after he spoke out about atrocities in Gaza. With the emergence of UpScrolled, there is a sense that Muslims are on the road to regaining their voice in a technological maze dominated by Big Tech aligned with Western interests.

Closer to home, Ummah Tech has served as a platform to consolidate South African talent and enable tech innovators to connect and collaborate in building solutions to address contemporary challenges faced by the Ummah. Ummah Tech co-founder Ismail Dhorat stated that ‘as Muslims, we have to embed Islamic values and ethics in the tech that we build’. This reflects the idea that technology should benefit humanity.

Since the genocide, there has been an explosion in the creation of tech-centred nodes, including Ummah Tech and Muslim Tech Fest. These initiatives continue to realign priorities, using technology for upliftment. There appears to be a slow yet steady realignment of priorities when it comes to building technology, suggesting the beginnings of a renaissance.

Key features

Users can post text updates with a 4 500-character limit, upload up to 20 images, and share videos of up to 20 minutes. The user experience allows story updates in a similar manner to Instagram and Facebook. With more than two million downloads, the platform has seen significant uptake.

Audience interests are segmented into categories, including sports, news, politics, tech, gaming, food, health, travel, money, culture, science, anime, humour, pets, books, history, art, nature, photography, hobbies, opinion and global awareness. Businesses also have opportunities to advertise on the platform. A review process is in place to ensure a balanced approach that prevents the politically biased takedowns prevalent on Meta and TikTok.

Western hegemony has been challenged by innovations such as UpScrolled. These platforms provide a means for the voiceless to confront media double standards, ensuring that stories from the developing world are not silenced and that stories from Gaza receive the same prominence as those from Ukraine.

The rollout of technology such as UpScrolled sends a bold message: the Muslim world is not only a consumer of digital media but also capable of deploying technology embedded with sound values to solve modern challenges. It is about regaining control of the narrative and building a more equitable digital future.

UpScrolled is available on Apple and Android platforms.
Follow Issam Hijazi, the founder of the platform, for updates.
Follow @upscrolled for the latest features.
Follow Bisan Owda on TikTok.
Follow Tom Hall on UpScrolled. He writes on current and historical Palestine and its liberation.

Hasanain Abdullah is a tech writer for Muslim Views and a communications and media specialist. Connect with him on LinkedIn.