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Federal Bounty on Spammers
Portigui writes "CNN is reporting that the FTC is considering imposing a bounty on spammers. They are guessing it would take between $100,000 to $250,000 to get people to rat out their friends, coworkers, etc... Interstingly enough is that it is 'higher than rewards in most high-profile criminal and terrorism cases. For example, the FBI pays $50,000 for tips leading to the arrests of most of its top 10 fugitives.'"
a bounty on /. dups...
Do you have ESP?
... the rest of the population would probably be more than willing to chip in on those rewards! I'd give $20 to help catch spammers in a second!
-beaker
Ah, the return of the dupe articles of articles that aren't even 24 hours old.... How I did not miss thee.
It's better to burn out than to fade away
Democratic Order Of Planets
Kind of like your UN.
What?
No like the Federation of Planets on Star Trek.
Oh!
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
this
But the question I have to ask - are they really worth persuing to this degree? I'm not trolling (seriously) but I'd rather see my tax dollars paying for takedowns in more serious crime..
I don't read your sig, why do you read mine?
I think I saw this yesterday O_o Could this be considered spam?
http://ipod.fresh27.net/
I think we need the return of the old western "Wanted Dead or Alive" posters.
...what Lessig's been advocating for some time. Good!
"People" using "unnecessary" quotes should be "shot".
Spammer would appear to be categorized as worst community offender than our local serial rapist.
Is this a start of a new legal trend where economic damage has precedence over human life?
Spammers Wanted: Dead or Alive. Preferably dead....
1. Go here
2. Find high moderated comments, and repost them.
3. Karmic Profit!!!
do not read this line twice.
Would be the perfect person to rat out, not only does there datacenter disregard spammers who host there, he also spams quite a bit himself.
Why would I do it ?
1) They screawed me out of a $2000 check.
2) They screawed me on my taxes.
3) They still have some equipment of mine.
4) Even for $10,000 it would be worth it to me.
until (succeed) try { again(); }
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/09/16/235021 1&tid=111&tid=98&tid=1
Someone needs to make a "dupe" ditty that we can all sing along....
Don't we know where most of the spammers are spamming from anyway? Why not just pay the ISPs to stop allowing the fuckers from having bandwith?
.kr, .br, etc from sending their spam into our country!
Better yet why don't we just do it for free and block their IP blocks from all routers across the net?
Hey, an even better idea is a "Great Firewall of America" where we can keep the
Next time 34564gnshe@yahoo.com or DSggh5r4555@hotmail.com sends me some spa, I am reporting their ass to the feds. Now I just need to figure out what to do with all of that money...
"Well, I wanna turn in Billy, man!"
"Hey, whatta you talkin' 'bout, man?!"
"Man, you sold me those email addresses on that CD, they all bounced back, man! Opt-in, my ass!"
And so on.
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
They are guessing it would take between $100,000 to $250,000 to get people to rat out their friends, coworkers, etc...
Holy shit, spammers have loyal friends. I'd rat 'em out for a happy meal.
Better yet lets beat daddypants with a stick with every spam we get in our inbox and twice for every dup.
That will stop spam!
Yes, it was here yesterday. I guess the FTC is really wanting to emphasize the point and drive it home. They plan to say the same thing every day, just like spammers, in hopes that something will click....
--
As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
No, I'm not trolling or baiting, but think about it: would you rather have a $50k bounty on your head for work whose profit is of religious significance or a $200k bounty on your head for work whose profit is one or two orders of magnitude lower?
...to buy a dictionary and learn how to spell 'screwed' properly. :)
"People" using "unnecessary" quotes should be "shot".
So they offer $100000 to catch a spammer. How much jail time will he get? If we are talking about a year in the slammer then I'll spam someone then call it on myself - 3 meals a day, TV all day long, well stocked library, out in 9 months for good behaviour and a nice $100000 paycheque once I get out. Beats looking for a Oracle dev job...
Do not look into the laser with remaining eye.
I have a better solution.
Editors with enough interest in the job to actually read or at least monitor their own web site.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
That's so funny.
That's so funny.
That's so funny...
Let me just say,
That's so funny.
My sig left me for a younger user id.
Okay, now how about free subscriptions for people that filter out dupes?
...Dupe stories are just as good to post bitchy comments as new ones...
Anyway, I wonder if the bounty is higher for spammers, because, a successful spammer will have more money that they can be fined for, to offset bounty reward payouts. I mean, how many terrorists have a million bucks stashed in the bank, and a expensive home in California? You can't fine em money and expect to get anything if they don't have money.
(I have an uncle who is a lawyer, and he joking once told me the first rule of being a lawyer is never sue poor people.)
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
Do you need a new mortgage?
Do you want to earn your d1pl0ma?
Do you want a Nigerian penis?
Send $1 to:
Happy Dude
355 S 520 W, Ste. 100
Lindon, UT 84042
Sincerely,
Darl McBride
via Gzip Christ
You know what?
You know...I don't even think stealing all the +5 comments from the original post would work...as everyone likely still remembers who posted what in the old story.
I suppose this dupe was the result of Hurricane Ivan?
This may sound bad, but unless the FBI is after a mass murderer; Spam affects more people. So it is in the best interest to offer more money.
------
"And may your days be long upon the earth."
Does this mean I can rat out my coworkers who insist on forwarding jokes with their whole addressbook in the TO: field AND GET PAID FOR IT?!
#include <sig.h>
No, it implies (to me) that spammers are harder to track down than regular criminals without community help.
I mean you have no crime scene to investigate, no fingerprints or DNA or other physical evidence to link the suspect to the crime.
About the only real way to bag a spammer as I can see is with eye witness testimony. Any "evidence" you collect online is easily thrown out by an attorney with the "anyone could have forged that" or "my clients box was hacked because of an insecure OS".
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
de ja vu!
or else!
Maybe we just need a few more hurricanes to finally put the spam problem to rest!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Slashdot has editors?
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Is there any evidence that spammers have co-workers or friends (who are not themselves also spammers)?
Me to FTC: Hey, I'm thinking about hosting some spammers.
;)
FTC to Me: Here, have some money, maybe you'll change your mind.
Sounds like the broken farm subsidy system.
A bunch of geeks dressed up as Bobba Fett looking for spamers.
LOAD "SIG",8,1
When it comes down to the logistical standpoint of fighting crime (ala $) Top-Ten fugitives aren't very dangerous. Sure they might kill a handful of people but they can't compare to the relative mastermind it takes to generate a boatload of spam and get it past a few spam filters.
:(
Now I don't mean to sound cold. I know that this certainly wouldn't make any difference if someone close to me were directly effected by the capture of a criminal, but the honest comparison is dozens of lives to thousands and thousands of people having to fight spam.
If I didn't know better, I'd think I've lost my soul for that comparison...
"Your sister was brutally murdered, but the guy who could have caught him had the option of Billy the Bludgeoner and that punk kid sending millions of annoying emails. He went to bank by helping capture the kid."
- Dan
There's something about the title to this article that brings to mind Boba Fett going after the bounty. It's just nice to imagine him swooping in undetected, catching a spammer off-guard, and getting his man. I wouldn't mind a little carbonite freezing action either as the true evil of the universe are returned to the authorities, but then again I've let my fantasies get the better of me.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
This is a real job! Hundreds of jobs just got created. I can now hunt down those senders of thousands of junk emails to my account.
Where to report? I can already see my money! Yeah! Great... I'm giving up all my other jobs, to pursue this - it is my future career. I'm secure for my lifetime - long live spam, and the spammers (so that I can keep getting bounty).
i guess the editors thought this story was so important that they had to remind us repeatedly.
/. ?
personally, i'm looking forward to the third dupe repost of this same story.
anyone know the record for dupe stories on
I know a few people that used to work in technical support for certain software companies that could profit from this. Example: say a spammer calls up a tech support place for help with the OS his spam box is running on. It *has* happened, I know the tech he talked to. Then Happy Tech turns in Mr. Customer for the 6 figure reward.
That's what I call 2 birds with one stone. Tech Support revenge AND Spam Revenge.... I'm failing to see the downside here....
"Don't sweat the petty stuff and don't pet the sweaty stuff." -- by an Unknown Wise man.
Has anyone kept tabs of all the duplicates? Which editor has the worst track record?
"The world only exists in your eyes. You can make it as big or as small as you want." - F Scott Fitzgerald
If the feds had a law similar to California, people and companies can bring private lawsuits against spammers for $1,000/spam. No need for bounties.
Fight Spammers!
Dig this excerpt from the end of that article:
But the idea may be premature, according to the Direct Marketing Association, the largest trade group for direct and interactive marketers.
The group believes it would be wise to give the law and law enforcement efforts more time to work before "rushing into a system like this," spokesman Louis Mastria said.
Seems like the corporate media is always willing to give corporations and their lobbies plenty of slack, always ready to bend over backwards for them.
corporate media & corporations,
sittin' in a tree
K-I-S-S-I-N-G
eat shiat and bark at the moon
WOW the first "screw karma" / "I know i'm gonna get modded down for this" etc. Post that ACTUALLY GOT MODDED DOWN
The laws are pitiful and full of loopholes built in by the direct marketing lobbyists, and even Eliot Spitzer has mostly given the spammers he's prosecuted mere slaps on the wrist.
If I were a spammer, I'd have a friend turn me in for the reward, take the minimal risk that anyone could actually prosecute me on it, then split the reward with the friend. Sounds like instant profit to me...
... and probably an easier way to "make money fast" ;-) than actually spamming...
For that matter, such a scheme could work well enough to bring new people into the spamming field just to turn themselves in...
Is this like ye olde bounties on ye rats and snakes and stuff, where you got paid for the skins?
If so, I'm in, dammit. Killin' me some spammers would make my year!
--
Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
I'm looking forward to the return of April Dupes Day.
Just remember, behind every dupe article is a submitter who didn't see it posted the first time.
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I'd be proud as hell!
Pull the licenses of the mortgage brokers using spam and faxes to sell their services. It's that simple. I'm getting faxes for companies advertising penny stocks also. Where's the SEC? Why are they allowing this? The company's disclaimer says they're getting paid via stock and cash to advertise the company. Prevent the listing, prevent the offering, santion the company. Watch how fast they straighten themselves out.
Follow the money. And stop bending over for the DMA. All the Can-Spam act did is make Richter and his cohorts legitimate. If the legislators wanted to put a stop to spam, they would. But they like the corporate money too much. Follow the money and stop the bullshit.
Spam is a waste of bandwidth and storage. But most annoyingly, it's a burglary of my time.
Everyone who has been on the receiving end of the convicted spammer should get a full 8 hour day to waste THEIR time. I'm sure they'd *love* to sit in a cell while I take them on a leisurely tour of my vacation photos or my high school annuals.
No, this is not a bleeding heart "what about the hungry" post... If we risk the assumption that funds are set aside in a budget for this and can only be used for this, wouldn't it be better to spend those funds on building a new email system and helping vendors provide easy migration to the new system? I think fighting spam is a lost cause as long as the technology allows it, and tacking on various odd bits to the technology doesn't really resolve the core problems.
If I have to suffer yet another misguided federal usage of my money, and it must be to hold our hands and try to fix our spam problems, then I'd rather know it was going toward a real solution, even if that just meant spending it on research into ways to build an email system that provides for impossibility of spam, cross-platform (and designed-to-be-safe) support for styled text and embedded images (i.e., "rich" documents), and protection of sender privacy (which may be at odds with preventing spam, thus the need for research rather than a slapdash quick fix).
(I take it from earlier posts that this is a dupe article so maybe it's pointless to post this here, but I'm bored this morning...
No Laughing Allowed!
Interstingly enough is that it is 'higher than rewards in most high-profile criminal and terrorism cases.
Even though the potential for harm for the top 10 is bigger (in terms of murder, etc), unless the person is a terrorist plotting large-scale attacks, the economic damage from a spammer would be much larger. This argument would have been a lot more convincing four years ago.
Still, if it gets rid of all those v!@gr@ ads, I'm all for it.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
Shouldn't that be:
Dupe, Dupe, Dupe, Dupe of URL....
Don't underestimate the power of The Source
CowboyNeal had a first post on this story!
I'd rat out just about anyone for spamming for like $1000. let alone 100x that.
Although oddly I don't have a problem with well focused spam. I dont' mind getting spam from my regional compeditors and suppliers. But knock off Pfizer products is a little annoying.
Just remember, behind every dupe article is a submitter who didn't see it posted the first time.
Sometimes stories are marked "pending" for days, so it's not always the submitters fault.
riding round the world on an old motorcycle
But you know that already!
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
Isn't that supposed to be USPTO?
HELLO!! the internet isnt all american. a bounty will work in the US. But will it with in the czech republic. What about spammers in thailand, china and anywhere else. These bounties wont work as a solution long term.
Don't forget children, report all suspicious people who you think are terrorists, spammers, or file sharers to the local Ministry of L-- er, I mean FBI.
503 Sig Unavailable
The Signature could not be accessed. Please try again later or contact the administrator
Maybe the Slashdot editors could be replaced by the Google news engine, with a different set of priority rules. Then Slashdot could go on full auto. Might work better.
Interstingly enough is that it is 'higher than rewards in most high-profile criminal and terrorism cases.'
What did you expect? Violent crime usually only affects people in ghettos and inner cities. Spam affects everyone -- including a bunch of fat old white men who control the wealth and power in this country. Therefore it's a more important crime to impose stiff penalties for.
Don't blame me, I voted Libertarian. You want more of this type of crap, go ahead and re-select Bushoco this year.
Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
There are a few resons why legislation just doesn't change things! We have legislated equality, but that didn't end racism because we can't legislate stupidity. We have legislated anti-trust/monopoly laws, but that hasn't stopped monopolies because we can't legislate what consumers purchase. We can legislate spam but that won't end spam! I think the reason's are mainy because: A.) No matter what you believe as an American, our laws do not legislate the world! I may not be able to legally send spam from Arizona, but what if I drive on down to Tiajuana? B.) Spammers have just as much right to send you a spam email as the local Bashas has to send you a flier!
The problem and eventual solution lies within statement 'B' above. You see, Bashas foots the bill for said flyer....what does it cost the spammer? Little to nothing. There are two main approaches to effectively controlling spam and both approaches have little to do with legislation. First is technologically. I like the idea of an authenticated email system. If I had the brainpower to draft such a system I'd be hard at work on it instead of posting on /. If I had to have a special key, or invitiation to send someone an email, and that someone had to have a key or invitation to send me an email, that would make the spammers job much harder. Second is financially. We need to somehow reduce the amount of money to be made in the spamming market while increasing the costs of spamming. This will cause the market to shrink....of course one guy with an army of infected drones could probably produce as much email as the whole lot of them. Therefore, we, as in the internet community in general, need to become more dilligent and keep our systems from becoming tools of the spammer.
Yes I know I spoke in generalities. There are a lot of demands to stop spam and too few answers as to how. I, for one, am thoroughly convinced that legislation is not an effective answer though.
Be Safe! Sleep with a Marine. Semper Fi!
A patch of identifying fur? Or will their tails or horns suffice?
If you never make mistakes, it's probably because you're not doing anything.
Rocks? Don't you mean mail order catalogs?
Does a bear shit in the woods?
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
How does this affect zombies? Will little ol' grandmothers and 6-year old boys have an e-bounty on their head because they didn't properly patch their systems?
TIMMAY!
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
Now, is that just for the pelt, or do I have to bring in the whole spammer?
This is not my sandwich.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and pay to see yesterday's stories again!
Leben Sie jetzt die Fragen.
It's not as if the FCC is going to go after spam from say the phone company or the 20 largest contributors to the Bush campaign. No the little guys'l get squashed "for the children..."
... who write laws that effectively stop spammers? Writing legislation on commission, what a novel concept! Oh, woops, I almost forgot, that's what big-money lobbyists offer all the time.
Mathematics is not a crime.
This is a retraction of an earlier post... Whiplash II said it best here.
A minute of downloading, reading, assessment then deleting a SPAM times a million people equals 48 lifetime.
Spammers do fall in the same class as a a bon-fide qualified mass-murderer.
Spam, as a criminal activity, affects way more people directly than most other serious offenses. When you look at murder, for example, say one person kills another. That is obviously one victim. Add to that everyone that that person knows, and on average that crime affected ~ 100 people (making the math easy)? If that killer makes the 10 most wanted, there may be a $50,000 bounty out. That would be about $500 / person affected.
Look at spam then. One message goes out to 10 million addresses. Then multiply that one message by a conservative 10 messages per day.
Say both these criminals are out on the street for 100 days before each is ratted out. The killer has affected 100 people in this time, with one occurrence - about 100 effects. The spammer has spammed 10 million people with 10 messages for 100 days. That is 10,000,000,000 occurrences of the "crime".
Dollars per occurrence - Murderer - $50,000 / 100 = $500 / effect. Spammer - $250,000 / 10,000,000,000 = $0.000025 per effect
So the FTC is spending way less than the FBI for each of us affected by the crimes.
Perhaps they need a bigger budget? =)
You could be right! :)
"People" using "unnecessary" quotes should be "shot".
While I doubt it would happen, I would like to see spammers punished in other ways as well as the big bounty.
Divide the spammer's current net-worth - minus the minimum amount to live for one year - then liquidate and distribute it to everyone that received the spam. Or as many as can be reached after much effort. Make doing this a requirement for the spammer to keep out of federal prison. Make them show progress like an unemployed person has to show progress.
After one year if the person has not found a replacement job of any type or has gone back to spamming then induct them into a government menial job or military service in a non-combat role.
Not an ideal solution but it would at least re-distribute the wealth stolen by these spammers. You'll never get the time back though...
"Bah!" - Dogbert
The problem I have is one of weight. Overall, one spammer can literally annoy hundreds of millions of people. While any one individual might not more more than somewhat annoyed, in the aggrigate I find this to be a huge crime against humanity - like spitting in the faces of a million people at once.
Almost no other crime has the ability to affect so many people at once. That's why I am happy they are taking this more and more seriously.
Aside from that argument and one of the money it costs businesses to deal with, the rise of spam has also led to the rise of viruses and the like - which are needed to harvest computers for use in sending spam. If there were no so much money flying around for spam I am pretty sure the degree and complexity of exploits would be far lower, as there would be many fewer people working on them with fewer resources. Eventually the combination of organized crime and great technological sophistication being developed is not going to lead to even huger problems, with real systems like banks or other things that seem more serious at the moment.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Dear Slashdotters,
Do you need a new mortgage?
Do you want to earn your d1pl0ma?
Do you want a Nigerian penis?
Send $1 to:
Happy Dude
355 S 520 W, Ste. 100
Lindon, UT 84042
Sincerely,
Darl McBride
------
Oh wait, we were supposed to pull DIFFERENT posts? I thought the plan sounded kind of lame.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I can only agree. At some point the annoyance of some number of people has to go beyond the killing of only one. I don't know what that number is but I know spammers have more than crossed it.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Alan M. Ralsky
6747 Minnow Pond Dr.
West Bloomfield, MI 48322-2663
248-926-0688
amr777@comcast.net
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
Do I get one of those nifty KGB badges for my collection of law enforcement memorabilia too?
~ People that think they are better than anyone else for any reason are the cause of all the strife in the world.
This reminds me of ole Dilbert strip about PHB reward system for finding bugs in software...
Wally said: I'm going to write me a minivan.
Along a similar line of thought, if ten million people around the world each pay a nickel to see their favorite celebrity in some tabloid paper, that may accumulate to a bounty big enough to send paparazzi photographers chasing said celebrity on motorbikes, perhaps killing her in the process... Then tell who isn't guilty?
More frivolous federal spending!
I can't believe people still think this administration is "conservative."
Garry AKA -Phoenix- Rising Above the Flames
Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes
I wonder how many of these spammers already headed for Tora Bora...
On second thought, will they be safe? Chased by the US, and run out they those ahead of them.
Hmm, imagine if Bin Laden could start spamming all the ISP's. THEN, they'd be forced to deal with spam once and for all.
I can see it now: "Spammer twirls and drops thong in a depsperate comedic plea to sqaut in dangerous territory...
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
In that case you have individuals on individuals - the process is not as direct. As a spammer I directly annoy millions of people, with no human intermediary.
In the case of the Paparazzi, only one person is really responsible - the driver of the car. Did millions of fans cause the driver to drive at unsafe speeds throug a tunnel? Nope. There are other ways to deal with harrassing biker photographers. Even the bikers themselves I do not feel are responsible, even if a contributing factor.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Two questions:
1. What do we do when the spammers raise the stakes (or, raze the steaks) and forge the spam even better? Next, we could have the cops so busy, they'll either ruthlessly and incorrectly charge the innocent, or they'll just walk away from bad press.
2. Why not pay someone to spam the hell out of the agencies charged with reducing spam? (I am assuming that one agency of the government allows it to spur the lazier agencies into action, hehehe.) If spammed to hell, I am sure the FBI would go all-out. And, they might actually enjoy inter-agency cooperation... The police would never again say, "You're out of your jurisdiction..."...
David Syes
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
"Frankly, I still think the proper thing to do is to have a large statutory penalty, say $10,000/spam, that anyone can collect in small-claims court."
If we raise the penalty to $10,000,000 per incident, would that be "statutory rape"? Or ineffective, inefficient process of law?
Seriously, whatever is going on with the "spam flag"? Spamming would be less effective if people could filter it out, but then the spammers would get paid less, too, if their payload is universally ditched on detection.
Even with Sender ID, I think eventually "sophisticated" spammers would just adapt like cockroaches, toad, sharks, alligators, and non-hardening feces and just learn to forge or hijack valid email. Maybe they would set up their own "Man in the middle" e-mail servers to strip spam flags from or make "legit" the payload they can intercept.
Pretty soon, spammers tapping into cables or bribing their way into datacenters might be a problem.
Maybe keying/encrypting traffic is the likely best way to deal with this, but, "Where there's a way, there's a will." as a Marine SSGT I once reported to would tell us for motivation.
David Syes
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
There are too many "Dupe"'s there, but that makes them dupes, right?
I think long jailterms are the wrong thing for people who commit computer crimes such as spamming, virus writing and the like.
I think their punishment should be to work in a tech support helpdesk for a number of years. It's the worst tech job you can have really. Of course they'll have to be supervised heavily to ensure they don't instruct sheeple to turn their home computers into zombies and the like, but its still a lot less monitoring required than a prison.
Question everything
Just kidding....
lower than religious significance?
Spam has gotten so out of hands these days that I'm surprised it hasn't come to this. Would anyone be surprised if this suddenly happened?
Your ad here.
Dead or alive? Do I get to pick?
But bounties also mean that a spammer has to worry about unemployed highly skilled dotcommers or bored teenagers hunting them down for the reward money. Recent news reports indicate that about 500,000 tech people have lost jobs in the last couple of years. Spamhaus estimates that most of the world's spam comes from the top 200 spammers, so they're outnumbered 2500 to 1. At $100K a head for the winning spam-hunters, that'd be a mere $20M to catch them and shut them down; I'd think the big ISPs would pony up that kind of money just for the cost savings.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Sure, just hitting "D" doesn't take very long. If Spamboy can do that once a second, and he sent ten million spams last week, he ought to be done by spring.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Funny : Although no pysical person seems to be allowed to prosecute a spammer for his/her losses to them, they are "required" (read : forced, by way of an extra tax) to pay for any bounty offered for capture of those miscreants.
....
I've got a good idea : let the very companies, who are allowed to recuperate their, losses by sueing a spammer, pay the bounty.
Why should I, as a mere end-user of the system, be required to take my losses (due to the time busy with both removing spam, as well as the cost of anti-spam software) without a right to recuperate them from the person(s) causing it, and than have to pay for the costs of finding those culprits too.
I can be wrong, but it looks like a lose-lose situation for me
This is the only motivation I needed. I have now decided to become a bounty hunter.
In Repressive Burma, it's not just your connection that dies. slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=314547&cid=20819199
Then let subscribers view not-yet-rejected story submissions. It wouldn't eliminate dupes, but it'd improve the situation. (And give me more to read. :)
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