MS sues UK spammer
Civil action avoids spam law technicalities.
Microsoft has sued and reached an out-of-court settlement with UK spammer Paul Fox, after apparently despairing
of finding any success under UK spam laws. The Manchester man was accused of breaching Hotmail usage rules,
after Microsoft picked up 250 spams a day from his campaigns.
UK spam laws introduced in 2003 have yet to bring a single conviction, despite EU rulings insisting member states
provide adequate legal protection from spam, and the civil case was seen as a simpler way of stopping the man.
'It's always good to see spammers brought to justice,' said John Hawes, Technical Consultant at Virus Bulletin. 'It's a
shame that local laws are seen as inadequate though - clearly more needs to be done to ensure this sort of activity is
made irrefutably illegal and punishable, on a global scale.'
The UK 'Privacy and Electronic Communications' law is online
here.
7 September 2006
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