Slashdot Mirror
Facebook Awarded $711 Million In Anti-Spam Case
An anonymous reader writes "Facebook is on a never-before-seen legal rampage against high profile internet spammers. Today Facebook was awarded yet another nine-figure settlement, this time for over $700 million. Facebook also has a criminal contempt case on Wallace, which means a high likelihood of prison, a big win for the internet and a milestone in cyber law. 'The record demonstrates that Wallace willfully violated the statutes in question with blatant disregard for the rights of Facebook and the thousands of Facebook users whose accounts were compromised by his conduct,' Jeremy Fogel wrote in his judgment order, which permanently prohibits Wallace from accessing the Facebook Web site or creating a Facebook account, among other restrictions."
There's a certain point where we need to consider the death penalty for this sort of thing. Sure, we normally only use the death penalty for heinous crimes, but from a utilitarian perspective it is quite clear that people like Sanford Wallace are doing far more damage to society. If Wallace is taken out and shot he'll lose about 365*50*24= 438,000 life hours. On the other hand, even a year or two of Wallace's normal behavior causes the rest of society to lose far more time. We should consider a death penalty for serious spammers or possibly a long sentence where he is kept far away from any computer.
... the money to the users who suffered damage?