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Microsoft to Fight Crime With Spammer's Millions
daria42 writes "It looks as if the $7 million Microsoft won from spam king Scott Richter won't go into a Swiss bank account and never be seen again after all. The company plans to dedicate a cool $5 mil to helping law enforcement agencies address computer-related crimes. Another $1 million will go to New York State to "expand computer-related skills training for youths and adults", with the rest being flagged to pay Microsoft's legal costs."
It's not explicity written in the article that the money will go against spammers. Instead, it is said about crime. We can only suppose computer crimes. It's much larger than spamming and one might believe it's just a PR stunt where they will simply use 5$ million dollars to fight against people who "illegaly" obtain Windows Vista, maybe?
First, I'd rather Microsoft come out on top than spammers.
But I am interested and baffled by the concept of "punitive damages" and how they are paid to the litigating party rather than to the general tax revenue base. If a company or person is to be punished for doing something wrong, shouldn't the government be the one to mete out that punishment? Why should a private citizen or company be allowed to reap the windfall of punitive damages? I think the justice system turns the court into a lottery by allowing such huge awards to be paid to offended parties.
In a sense, Microsoft is doing what I think ought to be done with punitive damages. That is, 1) to pay the winner's court expenses, and 2) to have the government receive the punishment money. Not that I don't think that Microsoft isn't doing this out of self-serving long term planning, but I do agree with the action (perhaps not their guiding principle).
I would like to see more spammers put out of business. However, as long as there are people willing to buy their products, spammers will be out there trying to bilk them.
Jesus saved me from my past. He can save you as well.
This is to cover for the embarrassing $50,000 that Eliot Spitzer (NYAG) settled for with Richter the first time around. I couldn't believe it when I read it the first time, that the AG was settling with Richter, one of the worst spammers in the world, for $50,000. That really showed that Spitzer was outmaneuvered by Richter or Richter was so good at covering his tracks the first time around, especially since MS was involved with the first investigation also.
Knowing a bit about NY politics/showboating since I'm from there, it seems that Spitzer must've insisted on doing things his way the first time around and ended up with the ridiculous $50,000 settlement. With MS taking the lead this time (MS is issuing the press releases on this one this time, Spitzer issued the press releases with the last settlement), it certainly appears MS did a much better job investigating and nailing Richter than Spitzer could ever dream of.
That million for New York is still going to be touted by Spitzer as a joint effort, and he'll be taking the credit for providing that money to schools (because of his investigation) during the gubernatorial election which everyone knows he's running for. $50,000 for arguably the king of spam. Pocket change to him. Richter must've wet himself laughing when his lawyer told him how much the settlement was for the first time around. Looks like 2nd time's the charm in this case.
If it's going to law enforcement, It'll end up going to the "OMG Kiddie PorN!!!!!!!! It's teh evil!!!!!" fund.
Don't get me wrong. Child pornographers deserve their own special ring of Hell. But it seems that to law enforcement, computer crime == kiddie porn. Period. No other crime occurs on a computer. Ever. Just child porn. Nothing else. End of line.
There are other crimes occuring involved the magic, glowing grey box.
There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell 'em.
As a resident of NY, I'm actually in favor of this, even though I'm a linux die-hard. I *really* hope NY doesn't just toss this into the General Fund and lose it on some left-wing pork barrel project. That sort of thing is all too common here; the highway tolls were supposed to disappear years ago, and yet the tolls are still there. The power company in my part of the state is the single largest land-owner, and yet it pays no taxes. So, I really hope these MS funds are used for cyber-crime law enforcement. FWIW I think very highly of the police here; they usually require at least a 4-year degree and military/para-military background in my area. So, these guys tend to be big, strong, and smart. That doesn't mean they know jack-all about computer crimes or even computers. So if this means they get some computer crime training, that's fine with me. There are some *big* dataenters and backbone here, so I imagine the field is ripe.
C|N>K