SEATTLE (Reuters) – Charges against a man accused of being one of the Internet’s most notorious spammers could spell relief from millions of unwanted message clogging e-mail in-boxes, computer security officials said on Thursday.
“This is a great day for the Internet,” said Patrick Peterson, vice president of technology for IronPort Systems, which provides e-mail and Web security products. “Everyone involved in clapping those handcuffs on (him) are heroes.”
Robert Alan Soloway, 27, is currently being held without bail after his initial appearance in U.S. District Court here on Wednesday.
Soloway was indicted by a federal grand jury on 35 counts that include mail fraud, wire fraud, fraud in connection with electronic mail, aggravated identity theft and money laundering.
…Soloway is the first spammer in the nation to be charged with aggravated identity theft under the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003.
…Spam volume actually increased in the wake of the CAN-SPAM law, peaking in July of 2004 at 94.5 percent of global e-mail traffic. The rate of spam infection of e-mail networks has fallen back since then to 76.1 percent of traffic in April 2007, according to a report by security vendor MessageLabs.
“Certainly, every spammer in the United States had better think twice about staying in the business,” Peterson said.
I’m sure there are others ready to pick up his slack. His clients will just move on to another spammer because, face it: Spam works. It’s unbelievably cheap to send – especially using the methods this guy used, and even with a very tiny percentage of users who actually click on the links it’s profitable for the advertisers. Still, I prefer good old fashioned commercial spam to the nonsense I get from family and friends. Here is a great response to serial forwarders.
I’m pretty happy with Cloudmark for spam protection. If you get more than five or ten a day, try it free for a month and see if you like it. And if you’re a Monty Python fan, this spam is for you. Spamedy spam! Wonderful spam!
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