The owner behind Tinder buys controversial Q&A social website Ask.fm


Interactive Corp is the electronic holding company. IAC already possesses Ask.com and About.com, so Ask.fm will fit right into a package of on-line question and answer services.

IAC said in a statement that as portion of the purchase it is going to invest millions into revamping the security policies and procedures on Ask.fm. The Q&A service, founded by two Latvian brothers has that were, grown extremely , 20 million users at the start of 2013 to 180, most of them young people under the With this particular deal, the creators have effectively been bought out, and Ask.fm is going to be below the direction of Doug Leeds, who now runs IAC's Ask.com.

The business has signed an agreement with regulators in Maryland and New York to focus on new means of controlling cyberbullying using a free tool called ask.fm tracker. "They had a laissez faire, libertarian perspective," Mr Leeds told the BBC, including under its new management "threats of violence as well as other distressing content would 'not be welcome.'"