Spamhaus $11 million fine thrown out
Appeal court quashes earlier e360 compensation ruling.
Anti-spam operation Spamhaus, previously ordered to pay $11 million to mass-mailing firm e360 Insight
after refusing to contest a case accusing it of falsely labelling those behind e360 as spammers, has had the fine thrown
out in an appeal court.
The case was first brought last autumn, and after initially challenging
the charges Spamhaus withdrew from the case, as the US court in which it was brought had no jurisdiction over
the organisation's UK-based operation. e360 was thus granted a default ruling in its favour, with the
$11.7 million fine called for based on its own uncontested evaluation of the damage caused by
Spamhaus filtering out its mails. The spam fighting organisation was also ordered to apologise publicly and
to remove e360 from its 'ROKSO' list of known spammers in perpetuity - another ruling whose legality has
been questioned by the appeal court.
The appeal court ruling still grants 360 the case, due to Spamhaus' refusal to contest it, but has
passed the settlement award back to the lower court to be analysed more closely. Spamhaus continues to include
e360 on its list of spammers, and has suggested e360 brings the case to a UK court, where its activities
would fall under stricter anti-spam laws. Attempts by e360 to have Spamhaus's domain registration
revoked have been ignored by US courts.
A Wired.com blogger looks into the case in more detail
here, and carries a full copy of the
latest ruling (in PDF format) here.
07 September 2007
Tags:
legal, spam, spamhaus.
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