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Ohio Law Could Send Spammers To Jail
ej0c writes "We in Ohio are set to save you from Spam. The legislature, with AOL's help, passed a tough anti-spam bill (Reuters). Spam in Ohio, and you'll be in the can for 6 months, with fines of $25,000 per violation, or $2 to $8 per e-mail. Text of the Act."
Doesn't the federal "CAN SPAM" act prevent state laws from taking effect? I thought that was one of the main provisions that kept the new California law (at the time) from happening.
Well, I do all my spamming from China. Come get me.
Life is the leading cause of death in America.
...who owns a Zombie machine. I hope that was taken into consideration.
1) Does this affect spammers who operate in Ohio but send the spam from outside of the state? Or outside of the country?
2) Does this affect spammers from outside of Ohio who send spam into the state?
We send drug dealers and drug buyers to jail, we should treat spam the same way.
We should punish the idiots that buy things advertised in Spam.
One could argue that the "war on drugs" is a failure, and for the most part they'd be right, but I was a kid in the mid to late 1970s and the culture has changed dramatically with regard to drugs. People used to smoke weed on downtown street corners, it certainly isn't that way anymore.
Take away the incentive to send the spam out and fewer people will risk it.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
There are already *plenty* of laws under which to prosecute spammers. They simply aren't enforced... The problem is not a lack of laws, it is a lack of resources/motivation/knowledge on the part of law enforcement. I would much rather see a commitment to spend a few million actually *doing* something - and when you consider the drain spammers are on the economy, it would be money well spent.
SSL Certificate
A prison term is the only way to truly deter someone from spamming. Financial penalties are pointless. When Joe Trailerpark decides to start spamming, he is faced with the choice of doing something that is financially lucrative or doing the next best alternative which would probably be something along the lines of working at Taco Bell. The way he sees it, even if he were sued for everything he had, he wouldn't be any worse off than he would have been by not spamming and taking the shitty fast food job. Prison on the other hand would make him really stop and think, and most likely he would decide that spamming just isn't worth it. Sure some people will do it anyway, just like some people sell drugs, but that is what the legal system is there for.
why don't we go after spammers in snail mail?
I really don't want advertisments ANYWHERE unless I say ok, so why is snail mail exempt? Granted, most of it is not offensive ( except for the odd jury summons ), but that doesn't change the fact that it's unsolicited junk mail, albeit arriving via physical means instead of electronic.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
I am all for taking a tough approach to spammers, but putting them in jail? Have you heard about the prison overcrowding problem?
Why don't we instead seize all of their assets, profits, and make some money for the people, instead of having to pay for them in jail?
Follow the money. If it comes back to Ohio then they've got a case.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Oh, get off the high-horse. For the average reader, Web and Internet are the same thing.
in essence, if a federal law does not specifically permit an activity, it is within the state's power to prohibit that activity. The State law here [but IANAL] appears very clearly written and defines all its terms and the crime described in those terms with some precision. If a spammer is fighting this law in court, they will have to show that the Fed regulation [sorry, text not available to me here] explicitly permits something that the Ohio law has prohibited. [Law is NEVER as simple as the people enacting it would wish or would promise their constituents.]
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
Wait a second -- you seem to be implying that if something isn't punished in another country, it shouldn't be punished here. Why not punish them here? It's not going to stop all spam, of course, but it doesn't make sense to scoff at each individual step because it doesn't solve the whole problem immediately. Even if all we do is stop all spam from inside the US (eventually, I hope) it'll then make it that much easier to identify spam and deal with spam.
I think that an investigation would prove an unwilling zombie to be innocent. If they can't find a money trail or anything for you, and no supporting evidence other than the existance of trojans on your machine, they must conclude you got hijacked. Someone just being clever in running a compromised machine on purpose to pretend to be a victim is going to slip up elsewhere, their life-situation may easily give them away. An investigation can show that you have stuff in your house you shouldn't be able to afford on your declared income, for example. When they start asking questions about that stuff, you're in trouble.
I don't like spam anymore than anyone else but my advice to you is to install a spam filter and shut up. I get one piece of spam a day.
Who the hell cares how much spam you hide from yourself, spam ostrich? Just because you don't see it, doesn't mean that it's not there. You still paid for the bandwidth the spammer used. If you're using your ISP's mail server, you paid them for the storage and delivery of the spam. Spammers are costing everyone money.
If you can't bare that toll, time to get off the Interweb.
While your time may have zero value, others do value their time and an attorney, CPA, or other professional using the net should not have to invest his time, or his money, fighting off spammers. Spammers are stealing from him and hurting his ability to earn a livelihood and should be jailed just like any other thief. Why the hell should millions of people have to invest billions of dollars and countless hours just so that spammers can spam without fear of jail time?
While your little geek-boy spam filter might suit your needs, I've worked with someone who consults to the real-estate industry and real-estate agents are bombarded with spam -- as well as legitimate business newsletters, business communications, and client communications. In order to be competitive, they have to post their e-mail address online. And that means that it gets harvested. They can't afford to lose a commission on a half-million dollar home sale by posting some javascript obsfuscated mailto link that doesn't work with the buyer's or seller's web browser. Nor do they want to get important mortgage rate information scrapped -- but they don't want some spam with a refinance-your-home scam.
I have my own domain and probably get two to three pieces of spam a week through my blacklists and filters, but I'm a grown-up, so I recognize that what I, as an individual, do isn't going to work for most businesses. If I bounce all mail from Taiwan, that's fine. If a business does, they might miss out on important correspondence that translates to large sums of money.
Why should I (an Ohio tax payer) pay to keep a non-violent criminal in jail? Most jails are so over crowded they parole people early to make space. I don't care if you want to fine spammers, but don't ask me to support them in jail. Jail should be for people who are a danger to society, not for someone who sends junk emails.