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Spammer Alan Ralsky Pleads Guilty
Czmyt sends the excellent news that one of the US's most notorious spammers has pleaded guilty and could serve 6 years in jail. "Five individuals pleaded guilty today in federal court in Detroit for their roles in a wide-ranging international stock fraud scheme involving the illegal use of bulk commercial e-mails, or 'spamming'... Alan M. Ralsky, 64, of West Bloomfield, Mich., and Scott K. Bradley, 38, also of West Bloomfield, both pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud, mail fraud and to violate the CAN-SPAM Act. ... Ralsky and Bradley also pleaded guilty to wire fraud, money laundering, and violating the CAN-SPAM Act. Under the terms of his plea agreement, Ralsky acknowledges he is facing up to 87 months in prison and a $1 million fine..."
Hang him from the nearest lamp post and then burn him.
Yeah, we should only allow company executives and rich investors to take vast amounts of money through share price manipulation.
We do have more lamp posts.
A little perspective please...
Yes, spam is damn annoying and the guys deserve imprisonment, and confiscation of every penny they earned through spam. But to compare fraudulent execs favorably to these, is a little overboard. Cheating you out of your money is lesser crime than spam?!?!
I'm much more funny, interesting and insightful than the moderators think
...involved leaving 10% of him here, sending 50% to the Prince of Nigeria, and sending 40% to the corrupt Nigerian government officials as a bribe. It has worked well for generations - But we'll need your help to complete the transaction...
Never underestimate the potential of Human stupidity. -Heinlein
Hey, at least those execs and investors didn't clog up my inbox with V|agr@ ads
1999 called. They want their spamfilter back.
Yeah, we should only allow company executives and rich investors to take vast amounts of money through share price manipulation.
Not to worry. If there are three things we have in abundance, it's rope, lamp posts and gasoline.
My blog
Cheating me out of my *time* and the usefulness of email *every* *dang* *day*? It's a close call....
I was going to post the sentiment until I saw the other AC above had beaten me to it.
Alan M. Ralsky, 64, of West Bloomfield, Mich., and Scott K. Bradley, 38, also of West Bloomfield, both pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud, mail fraud and to violate the CAN-SPAM Act. Ralsky and Bradley also pleaded guilty to wire fraud, money laundering, and violating the CAN-SPAM Act. Under the terms of his plea agreement, Ralsky acknowledges he is facing up to 87 months in prison and a $1 million fine under the federal sentencing guidelines while Bradley acknowledges that he is facing up to 78 months in prison and a $1 million fine under the federal sentencing guidelines.
John S. Bown, 45, of Fresno, Calif., pleaded guilty ... facing up to 63 months in prison and a $75,000 fine under the federal sentencing guidelines
William C. Neil, 46, of Fresno, pleaded guilty to conspiring to violate the CAN-SPAM Act and violating the CAN-SPAM Act. Under the terms of his plea agreement, Neil acknowledges he is facing up to 37 months in prison...
James E. Fite, 36, of Culver City, Calif., ... up to two years in prison and a $30,000 fine under the federal sentencing guidelines.
Any life is made up of a single moment, the moment in which a man finds out, once and for all, who he is.
Once he's in jail, we need to find out who his cellmate is, so we can send him inordinate amounts of penis enlargement ads.
If you open yourself to the foo, You and foo become one.
Thanks for the in depth analysis...
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
"Greetings friend, this is Homer Simpson, aka, Happy Dude. The courts have ordered me to call everyone, and apologize for my telemarketing scam...I'm sorry. If you can find it in your heart to forgive me, send $1 to Sorry Dude, 742 Evergreen Terrace, Springfield. You have the power!"
Finally we make real money from SPAM!
There are many here who say "It's just a little spam - have some perspective."
OK, so how about this perspective:
Let's just slap his wrist.
Once for every spam reported to Spamcop.net.
Just for one day.
After all, it's just a slap on the wrist - that's not so bad, is it?
www.eFax.com are spammers
Email filtering company MessageLabs reports that Egham, Surrey, on the suburban outskirts of London, is the town that receives the most spam in Britain.
"It's not like there's much else to do," said Boris Busybody, 77 (IQ), of Egham Hythe, idly whirling his four-foot penis around his head in a desultory fashion. "Expanding your manhood, growing your breasts, increasing your sperm ... the Lib Dem phone calls get a bit much. That's Doctor Busybody, by the way. My Ph.D arrived last week."
Spam has revitalised the local economy. Busybody has given up cab driving and is now working a lucrative job processing payments from home after he sent them his bank details in response to an urgent security message. "I had that King Otumfuo Opoku Ware II in the back of my cab once. Very generous and helpful fellow."
The Egham Tourist Board has seized the day, with plans for a 50 foot tall penis sculpture at Junction 13 of the M25 on the exit ramp to the town. The sculpture will be encircled by a genuine imitation Rolex and spray a fountain of Spermamax, obtained at a very reasonable rate from a Canadian pharmacy. "You will search an hour for your underwear in the ocean of our spam!" is to become the new town motto.
"I did get a good one the other day," says Busybody. "Barrister Matthew Sergeant Busybody of MessageLabs said we could promote our town to millions of people just by sending them an advance fee to process our incoming email. The stuff they try! 'Scuse me, V!k@grk@ kicking in, got to go have sex again. Sorry."
http://rocknerd.co.uk
That is less money that you will have to pay for downloading 25 songs, at least.
This guy was my neighbor when I was growing up. It doesn't surprise me that he grew up to be a spam king, he was always looking for a way to 'get rich quick' and had a more than average understanding of computers (and a less than average understanding of just about everything else). I can remember him running some sort of telecommunications software on his Apple II every time I was over at his house playing with his daughter. Now looking back on it, I wonder what he was doing and if it was legal. Then again he gave me hundreds of pirated Apple II games at the time so probably not (although I was one happy 10 year old).
Let's see, spammers provide financial incentive to operate botnets that do billions in damage. My mail server rejects over 99% of all incoming mail as spam. The remaining fraction of a percent is about 25% spam. Fail2ban triggers on about 1000 hosts attempting to brute force an SMTP password every single day. If I tail the logs, it's a continuous stream of crap 24/7. I could do without that.
It is a close call. I suppose we just need to make BOTH into permanent porta-potty scrubbers.
It is when I do it in my clown suit.
I wrote my first program at the age of six, and I still can't work out how this website works.