On Oct. 25, Sharjah police arrested two Arab men for stealing 1.8 milion AED belonging to a company in which one of them worked. The stolen money was located in the apartment of another employee of the same firm. The men used a duplicate key to enter the apartment with one of them carrying out the theft while wearing an abaya. Sharjah police were able to locate and arrest the culprits in less than 24 hours. Further investigations revealed that the two men left no fingerprints in the apartment and carried out the act in a very professional manner. One of the arrested men was found with 700,000 AED hidden in his car.

During the interrogation, the men admitted that they kept some of the money but transferred most of it to their home country. Based on their confessions, the men are now awaiting trial by public prosecution.

This crime came after the release of new data about the consistent decline of Sharjah crime rates. Crime rates in the first quarter of 2016 saw a 12.1 percent decrease compared to the same period in 2015. In an interview with Gulf News last year, Sharjah’s Police Chief, Brigadier Saif Mohammad Al Ziri Al Shamsi, commented that Sharjah police have “plans for early crime prevention,” including awareness campaigns to promote a culture of respect for the law.

At 8 a.m. on Nov. 3, doors opened for the launch of the iPhone X in the Dubai Mall Apple Store. Customers started lining up one day in advance to secure their spot for the limited iPhone. The first two customers entering the store were greeted by clapping and cheering from the store’s staff. Of the two customers, one pre-ordered the phone online while the other was the lucky first liner. Overall, between 400 and 500 customers lined up outside Dubai Mall’s iconic Apple Store, with queues stretching to the fashion district. There was much more hype for the release of the iPhone X compared to last month’s disappointing launch of the iPhone 8. According to Customer Intelligence Research Partners, the iPhone 8 and 8 Plus only accounted for 16 percent of quarter sales, but the figure for iPhone X is expected to be much higher.

Some customers, like Imat Musaev and his brother Musa, bought more than one iPhone so that they could resell them for a higher price.

“How much profit we make depends on the price in Deira now,” said Imat. This tactic of buying and reselling sparked some controversy among customers who don’t think it’s fair that a person can buy more than one iPhone due to its high demand. New restocks of the iPhone X are expected to come later in the month, but for now only the queuers were able to get their hands on the latest Apple product.

The creators of Whatsapp launched a new feature for the free messaging app on Oct. 27. It is now possible to cancel any message sent through Whatsapp. However, there are some limitations to this feature: the message can be deleted only up to seven minutes after sending it and cannot have been read by the receiver. To activate the feature, UAE users will have to update the application. Once updated, in order to cancel a message, tap and hold the message until a rubbish bin pops up, then tap on that and the message will be gone. Once the message is deleted, the receiving user will be notified that the message was cancelled. The feature comes as part of Whatsapp’s search for new methods to compete with other messaging apps such as Snapchat and Facebook Messenger. Currently, Whatsapp has one billion daily users and around 1.3 billion monthly users.