Slashdot Mirror
Dozens Charged in Spam Crackdown
JohnnyGTO writes "Federal and state law enforcement agencies have quietly arrested or charged dozens of people with crimes related to junk e-mail, identity theft and other online scams in recent weeks, according to several people involved in the actions."
But Mr. Linford of Spamhaus said he thought that the current wave of prosecutions had the potential to at least temporarily diminish the flood of spam.
Does ANYONE think that this will reduce spam in the near future? I'm still getting flooded, and I'll bet anything that my spam filters won't get any kind of a breather just because of a few arrests.
I'm sure "SlashdotMedia" will improve on all the wonders that Dice Holdings blessed us all with
Isn't part of the punishment for the crime supposed to be that it serves as a deterrent for other's who'd do the same thing?
... is lost, if you keep it a *secret*! Why didn't you tell the world, eh?"
To quote Dr. Strangelove:
"Of course, the whole point
Specialization is for insects. - R.A.H.
Does this mean that Ashcroft is now our friend or is this the wrong week?
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
Patience! We have to convict them first. Arrested != proven guilty.
:-}
After the proof, go for it. Don't bother with helmets when you drag them to the moon; the enclosure would restrict their freedom of speech.
The submitter missed the most interesting part of the entire article: the fact that this crackdown is financed mainly by spammers (the direct marketing assoc)! They probably are just trying to get rid of the most blatant illegal stuff so they can further their goal of legitamizing spam. Or they could just be cracking down on competitors with the Fed's help.
Much of the financing for the efforts, known as Operation Slam Spam, comes from the Direct Marketing Association, a trade group that wants to promote what it sees as the legitimate use of e-mail marketing.
Spammers get a lot of blame for all this, and they should - they're evil. But don't forget two important parties in all of this - the advertisers and the fools that actually READ their spam.
Any company willing to spam others needs to have its practices reexamined. How can the justice department go after spammers and not even blink at the advertising firms that PAY to have it all done? It's like putting the hitman in jail and ignoring the mobster that hired him.
And let's not forget that sending out mass emails has to be worth it to companies, otherwise one would think they wouldn't do it. There's a reason that you keep getting reminders to have your penis enlarged, and it's not because they found your email address on slashdot. People are buying this crap, and these morons need to be stopped now.
I'd call for more education on the subject ("How not to click on that popup" or "How to ignore or filter your spam email"), but due to the fact that it is much more gratifying and probably cheaper overall to just throw the emailers into jail, as well as the fact that I'm a nobody, my calls would proabably go unheeded.
Its fine with me if they kill off all the underground spamming from zombie'd windows boxes. If all spam originates from a cartel it will be much easier to regulate down to some sort of rational amount of communication. Right now we can't regulate spam because most of it is done outside of the law anyway. Aside from that, if all spam came from one group of people then it would be much easier to filter / block.
I submitted this story last night, and it didn't get posted.
"Legit" my ass.
It's an pyramid scheme, and I'm surprised they're still running, being as such operations are illegal in the US, and most other first world nations. They must be running offshore somewhere.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
as I posted before, I registered a special email address on FreeIpod just for fun. Just this morning, I got 3 spams on it. "Advance in Pay; On the way!" "Validation ticket for extra funds attached" "Payday advance pending. Please inquire within"
> Sell "execution privs" on a ebay to the highest bidder.
"chmod +x *", hardly used, $500 OBO