ISP wins $11 million from spammers
Judgement in EarthLink lawsuit grants heavy payout.
US ISP giant EarthLink, a regular champion of the CAN-SPAM Act, has won yet another case against a spammer.
The judgement passed this week in an Atlanta court this week grants EarthLink $11 million.
The spammers, Nevada-based KSTM, sent out millions of emails pushing mortgage websites, and the spoofed headers
were found to be in violation of the CAN-SPAM Act. The company was also charged with numerous breaches of computer
fraud and racketeering laws. Along with the financial judgement, they were prohibited from engaging in future suspect
email activities, and from using EarthLink accounts.
The case is one of hundreds of similar suits brought by EarthLink over the last decade. The company has been
awarded over $200 million in judgements, although much of the money has yet to be retrieved from the convicted
spammers.
'This kind of case rarely yields much actual cash for the winners, as the spammers and their funds are often hard to
pin down,' said John Hawes, Technical Consultant at Virus Bulletin. 'However, every victory pushes spamming a little
further outside the bounds of acceptable behaviour. EarthLink and others like them are doing us all a great
service by funding these important suits.'
Find out more about the spam problem at the Virus Bulletin conference (11-13 October, Montréal), where Rob Thomas and Dmitry Samosseiko (SophosLabs) will present their paper 'The game goes on: an analysis of modern spam techniques'.
See the full programme here or click here to register now.
14 September 2006
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