Anti-Spyware Law Snags Anti-Spyware Vendor

Country Lawyer writes "Washington state's anti-spyware law has just resulted in a $1 million victory for the state, the first successful prosecution under the new law. The weird thing? They sued an anti-spyware vendor." From the article: "Washington State went after the company after 1,145 state residents purchased the software and the complaints began rolling in. Secure Computer president Paul Burke will now pay $200,000 in penalties, make $75,000 worth of restitution to Washington residents, and pay another $725,000 to cover the state's attorneys' fees. The irony of an anti-spyware law being used against an anti-spyware vendor was not commented upon."

Comments

BS

[cwells]

"$725,000 to cover the state's attorneys' fees"

that's just insane!

change to 'a corrupt company anti-spyware vendor'

[ghostlibrary]

I think the 'lack of irony' is that the supposed anti-spyware company was itself corrupt. "The company allegedly spammed", did fake scans then informed customers they needed to buy the product ("Our investigation found that this so-called free scan always detected spyware, even on a clean computer,"), broke their own consent agreement, used shaddy sales tactics, etc.

So, oddly enough, it seems the law worked. Just calling yourself an 'anti-spyware vendor' is no protection from being a spyware company.

No. It was spyware

[darkonc]

It passed itself off as anti-spyware, but actually caused problems for users that installed it, was sold by spamming, etc., etc., etc.

I can fix that for you...

[MyNymWasTaken]

This is not a story of an innocent company harmed by a stupid & malevolent government. The company is the equivalent of a glass window replacer who advertises their services by throwing a brick with their flyer wrapped around it through prospective client's windows.

But did it really work?

[raehl]

We know that they paid a total of $1 million in penalties.

But how much in profits did they make?

If they made $2 million in profits, then the law didn't work at all.

Re:But did it really work?

[Anonymous Coward]

FTA

Secure Computer is actually based in New York, and has gone out of business since the lawsuit was filed.

I think it worked well enough.

That doesn't mean the owners didn't take all the remaining money and are laughing all the way to the bank and enjoying their retirement. Closing it down would be a logical thing for them to do under the circumstances, since the company would now be more likely to have its assets exposed to lawsuits from other states.

Re:But did it really work?

[louisadkins]

Ah, but did they re-open under a different name? I've seen that happen more than once. Scammer declares under the first business, closes the doors, and are protected. Then they open under a new name, as a new business. This makes it much harder to go after them as it was, technically, the first business that scammed. Lather, Rinse, Repeat.

how do they justify $750,000 worth of "work?"

[Anonymous Coward]

I dont get it. These people arent doctors, and filing a case against someone who is clearly breaking the law is a no brainer. Lawyers should make no more than $50 an hour.. And class action lawsuits never benefit the ones they are intended for. The Cum guzzling lawyers seep ever last sap of money for themselfs leaving the the rest of the people a $40 rebate somewhere..

please type the word in this image: Incest

Why is slashdot making me type incest?

My sympathy for them is near zero...

[mark-t]

Anti-spyware that cannot be easily uninstalled and constantly harrases the user to purchase an upgrade is no better at all than the malware that it proposes to eliminate. The tactics of such software are to harrass the user to the point that they ultimately surrender and buy the software simply to be rid of it. I've recently been witness to this happening on a Windows system that had both a firewall and current virus protection at the time, yet not even the latest antivirus signatures loaded into it would get rid of the malware. After spending three days trying to eliminate it using every tactic I could think of, I reformatted the drive and reinstalled Windows. For the sake of reference, it looked like it was promoting the software "Virus Bursters" and "Drive Cleaner". Any product I could find that claimed to get rid of them either simply failed to do the job or else cost money to get rid of it (although the scan was free). The latter policy frankly struck me as no different than the tactics that the author(s) of this particular malware are trying to employ, and I will not submit to such blackmailing tactics.

Spammer or company spamming = all the same

[ZDRuX]

But it was the way that Spyware Cleaner was marketed that attracted the Attorney General's attention in the first place. The company allegedly spammed users to advertise its product, included deceptive subject lines, failed to include an opt-out mechanism, and suggested that the product was "discounted" for a "limited time," when in reality it was always available for the same price. I`m *very* happy to see the government does not differentiate between spammers, and spammers acting as legitimate companies. To me it doesn't matter if it's your son delibatery sending me spam or your boss, you're all equally convicted of being jerks in my eyes, and I`m glad to see this court had the same point of view on this.

Re:State Attorney's Fees?!?

[DragonWriter]

But how can the State Attorneys submit a bill to anyone when they are salaried employees of the State?

The money to pay those attorneys' salary (and other expenses incurred in the litigation) come out of taxpayer funded accounts. The award of attorneys' fees takes money from the wrongdoer and puts it back in those accounts, saving the taxpayers the expenses incurred in the litigation and allowing them (through their elected representatives) to use that money for other purposes.

How do you justify a rate cap?

[Presence1]

There may be abuses, overcharges, and skewed payouts, but saying the nobody of some profession should ever earn more than $X per hour is absurd.

What you say is equivalent to some PHB saying that no programmer or system designer should ever earn more than $50 per hour.

In fact, some should earn much less, and some much more. Hourly rates are really just a shorthand in the capitalist system for how quickly you generate value.

I've got considerable experience in software and corp management, and so often had to deal with lawyers, mostly on IP and contract issues. As I worked with them, I was intrigued to find out how much the work resembled software development. In both arenas, one needs to evaluate the scope of the project, anticipate the opportunities, obstacles, and pitfalls, then design a structure that will handle all these cases. Once a overall plan and structure is selected, then the detailed modules or sections are crafted using custom code or language where necessary, and reusing pre-tested code or language where possible. SW Developers use the languages chosen for the project, and Lawyers use the English language and Terms of Art. Both professions have barely competent people at the bottom and utterly brialliant people at the top. Both have utter scumbags who should be shot on sight (spammers, spyware, or scammers), and others whose wisdom is a national treasure. Both professions have trivial problems handled mostly by cut-and-paste, and incredibly complex problems.

When given an interesting problem in their domain, the lower ones will take almost forever to come up with a bad answer, and the top ones will give a great answer almost off the top of their heads. This is what makes the good ones worth FAR more than the average, and the average ones worth more than amaterus on the street.