The corporate messenger Slack has sent a letter to users in Russia warning about the suspension of account operations within 30 days due to a new wave of US sanctions imposed on the Russian Federation.
Under the new restrictions, starting from September 12, 2024, American companies are prohibited from providing services such as IT consulting, design, cloud services for enterprise management, as well as software for design and production in Russia.
In the newsletter, Slack explicitly states the need to adhere to the sanctions regime and export control laws of the United States, the EU, and other jurisdictions against Russia. The letter states, “Our data indicates that your account is based in Russia, mainly used by Russian users, or is related to distribution in the Russian Federation. Unfortunately, in accordance with applicable law, we are forced to suspend its effect after 30 days.”
Pavel Potekhin, the executive director of MTS Link, noted that even companies that have obtained a license to use Slack abroad are receiving notifications about the blocking of accounts.
It is worth mentioning that in March 2022, Slack had already started to block some Russian users in response to sanctions imposed earlier.