Aliana Thompson | Staff Illustrator

At 9:19 a.m. on Feb. 24, WashU Emergency Management sent out an alert regarding an armed person to the Danforth Campus: “Run, Hide, or Fight.” Thousands of students, faculty, and staff desperately sought out more information. Many turned to Sidechat, an anonymous social media app geared toward college students. After about an hour, an all-clear message was issued. All signs point to the event being a false alarm, with no person found and reports deemed noncredible.

During the emergency, Sidechat filled a gap that official University alert systems could not — live, real-time threat assessments, community crisis response, and individual mobilization. The app’s role amid the false alarm reveals a need for a crisis communication resource within the WashU community; an alert system is not enough. A decentralized University communication system (preferably University-managed) is essential for real-time community engagement, emotional catharsis, and enabling a responsible, rapid flow of information for those who need it.

During the Brown shooting in December 2025, Sidechat played a critical role in informing students and keeping them safe. A look at how Sidechat functioned during, and shortly after, the shooting demonstrates how a crisis communication system might look at WashU.

The Associated Press (AP) analyzed over 8,000 Brown Sidechat posts that occurred in the 36 hours following the shooting, assessing real-time responses by students during the shooting and its aftermath. Comparisons can be made between the timing of the posts with the real-time whereabouts of the shooter, the university alert system, and the overall shooting events. 

There was an alarming delay between shots fired and official university alerts at Brown University on Dec. 13, 2025. It took almost 20 minutes for the first university alert to occur, likely due to official sources needing to corroborate the shooting and the information surrounding it. At the same time, Sidechat posts began circulating within three minutes of the shooting, providing a rapid community response to the event and allowing students to quickly share relevant information with each other.

Throughout the duration of the shelter-in-place order, university alerts did not provide any information on if a suspect was in custody or much about the police investigation at all. In the hours and days following the shooting, information from police, the FBI, and the university was sporadic and unclear with limitations likely stemming from legal constraints surrounding active investigations.

Real-time community communication outpaced official alerts, potentially saving lives in the process. One Sidechat commenter responded to a post about the shooting location, saying, “I was on my way there but saw this after someone told me. Whoever posted this, I don’t know, but God bless you. You saved my life. I went into hiding after you posted this. I will never forget that. Thank you.”

I can only speculate on how many people saw the initial flood of Sidechat posts before the official university alert, but if these posts saved even one life or prevented one person from getting hurt, then the benefits of real-time communication like Sidechat outweigh the downsides. 

Some have criticized the role of Sidechat as a crisis communication touchpoint. Sidechat can be a source of misinformation (which can be problematic during a crisis) while official university alerts are a much more factual source of information. However, this assumes that university officials and police are working with factual information at all times, which may not always be the case. During Brown’s shooting, for example, the university alerts warned about a possible secondary shooting 0.5 miles away from campus, only to correct the information nearly 40 minutes later, saying that it was a false report.

Further, the sporadic nature of university alerts during and following a crisis event like a potential active shooter means that families, community members, and especially students have no true way to receive real-time updates on the police response or suspect whereabouts. 

In the case of the event at WashU, Sidechat played a critical role in the dissemination of real-time information to students scared for their lives. Students were able to share updates on where they were hiding, the general affected area of the alert, and even if classes were on lockdown or professors were taking the alert seriously, allowing rapid communication to occur that otherwise would not have happened through a centralized official alert system. These communication efforts allowed students to become more aware of the situation in order to take control of their own safety and mitigate their risk of danger. 

Stressed students vented their fears and emotions, while others provided helpful messages on how to stay calm and safe, letting their peers know that they were not alone in such a terrifying crisis. Meanwhile, University alerts were brief and timed irregularly, likely doing little to truly relieve panicked students. 

Some may suggest that public user identification in an internal university communication platform could provide a route towards more responsible, helpful, and safe information, preventing the spread of misinformation due to increasing accountability. However, emerging studies on the role of anonymity in social media, including a recent report published in November 2025, have found that imposing public identification measures on users can result in diminished willingness to engage in vulnerable or emotional conversations, increase perceptions of risk for users, and limit the amount of users who are freely expressing their thoughts, views, or information that they know. In a crisis event, it is imperative that students feel safe to post any information they may have, as lives can hang in the balance. Additionally, I believe that during a crisis, all students would provide helpful information to their peers to ensure the safety of themselves and others. It is unlikely that people would actively spread false information unless they were intent on allowing harm to come to their peers, which I believe does not represent the WashU student body.

In both the incidents at Brown and WashU, Sidechat proved itself instrumental in ensuring student safety and provided a clear method for community response. Information was able to be collated and shared in real time, reaching those who needed it most without having to rely solely on sparse official communication. It is clear to me that the importance of Sidechat (or any community communication system) in a crisis cannot be overstated enough.

If we empower ourselves to take an active role in our own safety through real-time communication with each other rather than solely relying on sporadic external sources, then we can be sure to handle any crisis or any emergency that may come our way. If this method is through Sidechat, then I believe (during a crisis) we should utilize it to its fullest potential and enable information flow for those who need it the most. 

However, Sidechat is far from a perfect communication platform. With inspiration from Sidechat’s positive aspects, WashU has the opportunity to develop and offer its own decentralized community communication system. This system would be integral to information sharing, providing emotional relief, and ensuring the safety of others and those we care about.