This startup lets you share files safely and anonymously, and it’s easier than Dropbox

Five years after Dropbox took the internet by storm, sharing files with peers has become easier than ever, and startups have competed with giants in a race to capture the cloud. In addition to general storage services like those offered by Google and Microsoft, consumers looking to share photos or send PDFs can use enterprise-specific apps like Box. In some cases, simply sending photos through messaging apps like WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger might do the trick.

Yet the apparent surge in options for file sharing has brought with it some complications. Following allegations that internet giants like Google, Facebook, and Dropbox had been participating in the NSA’s PRISM surveillance program, many privacy-minded internet users felt betrayed by the very companies they had supported, and began looking elsewhere for more secure alternatives. In addition, now that file-sharing has become so widespread, storage services are prone to clutter and bloat – who likes sifting through 500 vacation photos just to find that one family reunion snapshot from five years ago?

Swooping in to address these concerns is the team behind Send Anywhere, a file-sharing app that lets users send and receive files while bypassing the hurdles imposed by the cloud. Think of it as “Dropbox meets Snapchat,” with some libertarian supervision.

No login needed

Perhaps the most startling feature of Send Anywhere is that it requires no login or registration, which ought to make privacy advocates beam with admiration. Sending files is a cinch. After pressing the ‘send’ tab on the app’s front page, users can select which photos or video files they wish to send over. After that, the app will generate a six-digit code and a QR code that a receiver can either input or scan. Since the files are transferred over peer-to-peer network connections like wi-fi and cellular networks, none of the data touches Send Anywhere’s servers whatsoever. Each code expires after ten minutes.

Send Anywhere also generates a ‘buddy list’ of devices one can share to. After sending a file to another user, that recipient’s device is automatically added to one’s contact list. Send Anywhere also draws from users’ existing cellphone contacts list to draw up other devices, and also identifies devices that are on the same wifi network as potential recipients.

After specifying which person’s device to send a file to, that person will receive a push notification with the file’s input code.

Send Anywhere is headed up by Yoonsik Oh and Suhyuk Kang of ESTMob, a Seoul-based startup founded in 2012. Prior to establishing their latest company, Oh worked for ten years as an engineer at Korea-based software firm ESTSoft (the former parent company of ESTMob, which has since spun off), while Kang spent time at Kozaza, a Korean Airbnb-esque service, after finishing a nine-year stint at LG.

(See: Forget Box, SkyDrive, and Dropbox, Tencent’s 10TB of free cloud storage is hands down the best)

Oh says that Send Anywhere was born out of his frustrations with typical file-sharing methods while working on other software projects. Sending emails was a pain, and using Dropbox-esque service required multiple log-ins and knowledge of his peer’s email addresses.

Partly cloudy, partly sunny