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Man Arrested for 'Spam Rage'
Mirkon writes "We've all gotten frustrated at some point with spam. Perhaps we've even been motivated to send nasty, threatening messages back to the spammers, just to vent some frustration. Wired reports that 44-year-old computer programmer Charles Booker did just that, and 'now faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.'"
So of course the guy goes nuts.
Now I see that they are able to send you animations/videos that get past Mozilla's image-blocking feature. Saw the first one yesterday, trying to sell me a Sony VAIO. How long is it going to be before I get one featuring erotic acts with barnyard animals?
The only thing that surprises me about this is that it wasn't a father who went nuts when seeing his little boy or girl subjected to some of this crap. Yeah, the penis ads are truly obnoxious... but to see your kids exposed to this some of this stuff? I could really sympathethize with someone going postal because of this.
Is this truly the only Earth I can live on?
It still sounds like the potential penalty is probably a little severe, but this isn't the type of reaction most of us would have.
If you're thinking of threatening savetrees.com (or whomever) with death threats, go and drink some chamomile tea, relax, and decide, in a rational way, what you're going to do about it.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
I must say, I am disppointed that no one is allowed to be legitimately pissed off without getting a lawsuit. Back in the late 1800's, people who were annoying were called out in the street and shot at. I'm not saying that shooting people is the answer, but we should be allowed to vent frustrations so long as they don't include actual, specific assault against someone. Email is not an assault, unless the person says they're gonna hurt you, and you have some reason to believe that they are not kidding around.
stuff |
What kind of help? I'll loan him a gun or two. Can any /.'er surreptitiously provide the anthrax spores?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
There's more information (including the company name, which Wired withheld) here.
Booker threatened to send a "package full of Anthrax spores" to the company, to "disable" an employee with a bullet and torture him with a power drill and ice pick; and to hunt down and castrate the employees unless they removed him from their e-mail list, prosecutors said.
Hmm, nothing wrong with that, lets look at it a little differently. The company in question -
1. Insulted him repeatedly about his penis size. Thus making the internet a hostile and intimidating place.
2. They made his computer unuseable causing a loss of income.
3. They intruded into his home and refused to leave his personal property alone.
And the government did nothing about it. Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness, all of these were infringed by the spammers. I think the defendant has his atitude wrong. He need NOT apologize, instead change his defense to "I was being harmed, pursued, harassed and the government refused to come to my aid. What options were left I was was to continue on with my life?".
Now THAT would be interesting, instead, all that we see is another story about hwo bad spam is. It will drive you crazy.
cluge
"Science is about ego as much as it is about discovery and truth " - I said it, so sue me.
Only Reliable, Medically Approved Penis Enhancement.
poor guy if he finds one of those enlarged pennis in jail...
"There is no teacher but the enemy."-Mazer Rackham
Yeah, but it was a very minor crime. It's the equivilant to me yelling, "I'll tear off your head and shit down your neck if you ever come near my wife again!" if I caught you kissing her at the bar.
1. I was provoked
2. There's no real evidence I have the strength to tear off your head so it's probably not serious
3. I make no actual agressive moves toward you
It's just blustery anger, the guy doesn't deserver, and probably won't get, jail time.
TW
Oh, so a corporation making ridiculous claims and flouting numerous laws in doing so is just fine, but when someone replies with empty threats, the judicial system brings down the hammer.
Yeah, this guy is obviously a total moron, but the case shows both how stupid the laws are with regards to spam, and how angry it makes people. It's like the kid on the schoolbus who gets poked and needled every day and nobody notices, but when he finally snaps and slugs one of his tormentors (or worse) it's a terrible thing.
I've done this in the past. Threatened spammers, that is. Nothing so dire nor graphic as this fellow, but I was angry enough that I wanted to get back at them somehow. I know someone who's said that he wants to torture and kill all spammers, and he's a totally meek, mellow guy for the most part. The anger people express about spam is very surprising, even more than telemarketing. It's surprising also that the bastards can make any money at all on a practice so universally reviled.
I used to care, back when I got maybe 20 spams a day. Now that I'm up above ~500, I don't care anymore.
Intolerance for ambiguity is the mark of the authoritarian personality.
Then he'd only be facing about a year in jail.
--- Ban humanity.
- He is an American
- He resides in the US
- He made the calls and sent the email from the US
- There are laws in the US and in the state in which he resides against making threats.
Any other questions?There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
All of what you say above is true.
But consider what would happen to an individual pervert who sent out hundreds of thousands of sick emails talking about penises, and continued to do so even after the recipients told him in no uncertain terms to stop?
He'd be thrown in jail, that's what would happen.
Why are businesses allowed to do things that individuals aren't?
Intolerance for ambiguity is the mark of the authoritarian personality.
This guy should be nuts. I mean, come on, why would anyone even say NO to an offer of 30% of US$10,000,000 ( Ten Million US Dollars only ) and FREE Pills(TM) to improve Sex Life(TM) ?
getSexySig();
Internet access in schools needs one thing...supervision. It is a remarkable tool for schools that don't have the resources or staff to do some of these things...the school district I work for is in a rural part of Illinois, and we don't have much access to the newest this and flashiest that...but with the internet, we are able to give kids access to more than we could ever hope to afford...I use a combination of filters that have reduced popups and crap on the internet to a manageable level on the supervision side. The biggest thing that I have found is not to use commercial solutions like Surfcontrol/Surfpatrol/Cyberpatrol/whateveryouwant tocallit...they are much more show than go. I use a product known as Dansguardian, which is a modified Squidguard. Block popups entirely, and block various vulgar words...while at the same time making exceptions for words like "cancer." Filter it to a negligible level...heck, just constrain your allowable domains to a few known research pages...but sheesh, don't get rid of it entirely! These kids are going into the century where they will be academically helpless without the ability to use a computer effectively to solve problems.
Here's what's going to happen after February 21:
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You're going to get tons of spam, and from major companies. This becomes legal, even in states where it used to be illegal.
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The headers will be correct. There are penalties for forging headers.
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The spam won't necessarily have the company name, just some unsubscribe URL and a P.O. box for written "opt-out" requests.
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You can go through the motions of "opting out", but it won't do much.
"Opt-out" is interpreted narrowly, on a "per sender" basis. "Sender" is defined narrowly - "The term `sender', when used with respect to a commercial electronic mail message, means a person who initiates such a message and whose product, service, or Internet web site is advertised or promoted by the message." (from S.877) Note the "and"; it's not there by accident. Each combination of spammer and advertiser may be considered a different "sender". That clause could even be interpreted to completely let third-party spammers off the hook.
So advertisers get to throw away the opt-out list every time they change spamhauses. There's even a "separate line of business" exception to make this explicit - spammers with both "Viagra" and "refinancing" spams don't have to use the opt-out list from one with the other.
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You can't sue. Only the FTC and the U.S. Justice Department can sue.
This was all carefully crafted by lobbyists for the Direct Marketing Organization, who will be celebrating as soon as they get some sleep, having been up all night getting this through the House.