Messaging platform provider Slack Technologies Inc. has partially rolled back a new direct-message feature hours after launching it due to concerns that it could be used for harassment.

The feature, called Slack Connect, allowed any Slack user to message any other Slack user at any organization. Slack pitched the product as a faster and more secure way to work with people outside of a company than email.

To connect with another user on Slack, an invitation had to be sent via email, with that user then accepting the invitation to connect. On the face of it, the offering seems innocuous, but some Slack users disagreed, claiming the feature could be abused.

The problem apparently lies with a custom message able to be included in email invitations.

“After rolling out Slack Connect DMs this morning, we received valuable feedback from our users about how email invitations to use the feature could potentially be used to send abusive or harassing messages,” a spokesperson for Slack told CNN Business today. “We are taking immediate steps to prevent this kind of abuse, beginning today with the removal of the ability to customize a message when a user invites someone.”

“When a collaboration platform adds features which extend beyond a single organization’s boundary, a complex set of issues inevitably arises,” Oliver Tavakoli, chief technology officer at artificial intelligence cybersecurity company Vectra AI Inc., told SiliconANGLE. “Email has historically been the primary channel for such interactions and we have spent the last couple of decades adding checks for inappropriate content, phishing, malware, et cetera to that channel. Slack’s decision to enable such a channel without any of those controls in place appears to have totally ignored this historical context.”

Dirk Schrader, global vice president, security research at information technology security and compliance software firm New Net Technologies Ltd., noted that the gaffe by Slack “puts some shadow on its roadmap process and the way features are selected and verified from all kinds of security aspects a user can be concerned about, including bullying.”

Slack is currently subject to an acquisition by Salesforce.com Inc. announced in December that valued the company at $27.7 billion. The deal is expected to close in the second quarter.

Photo: Slack