Slashdot Mirror
US Fears Loss of ICQ Honeypot
AHuxley writes "US law enforcement bodies view the sale of instant messaging service ICQ to a Russian company as a threat to homeland security. In spring 2010, Russia's largest Internet investment company, Digital Sky Technologies, agreed to purchase the service for $187 million from AOL. The US is sure that most criminals use ICQ and, therefore, constant access to the ICQ servers is needed to track them down. As the system is based in Israel, American security service have had access. The article concludes, 'Lawyers [of unspecified nationality] say that to block the deal the US Committee on Foreign Investment needed to cancel it no later than within 30 days after the deal has been announced — so unless the rules are broken, nothing can be changed.'"
Uh-oh!
By now they probably posted the link to this article in the criminal forum and are organizing a mass migration to MSN Messenger, GTalk and Facebook.
As a Slashdot discussion grows longer, the probability of an analogy involving cars approaches one.
They aren't going to MSN. Criminals don't want to be spammed any more than the rest of us.