

It is unknown whether the ICQMail service was launched before or after the AOL acquisition. This was a service similar to Hotmail of the time where users were allowed to sign up an account for free, were only given a very small amount of storage space, and the interface was ad-supported.

In June 1998, AOL, then still known as America Online, acquired ICQ.Īt some point in the 1990s (the date is uncertain), ICQ decided to launch a web-based only e-mail service, ICQMail. ICQ is an instant messaging service initially released in November 1996 the original company that developed and released both the service and client software was Mirabilis, which was based in Israel.
