YESSS!!!!!!! (Spammer's & Law related)

[The Yosemite Bear]

http://www.bayarea.com/mld/cctimes/business/7101458.htm

Pair fined $2 million for spam
By Ellen Lee
CONTRA COSTA TIMES

A Southern California business that sent spam hawking a guide for sending spam was punished Friday with a $2 million fine in the first such verdict against spam in California.

PW Marketing, run by Paul Willis and Claudia Griffin, sent millions of junk e-mails selling such tools as a "Guide to the Professional Bulk E-mail Business" for $39, violating a California anti-spam law, a Santa Clara Superior Court judge ruled.

The judge ordered the duo to pay $2 million in civil penalties and barred them from owning or managing a company that advertises over the Internet for 10 years without first notifying the attorney general.

"It shows that you really can go after these guys and take them on and get a significant judgment," said state Sen. Debra Bowen, D-Redondo Beach, author of the 1998 anti-spam bill. "Ultimately it is only this kind of big financial penalty that will discourage the spam factory."

California Attorney General Bill Lockyer filed the suit last year after receiving a number of complaints from recipients of the e-mail in Santa Clara and throughout California.

Now with California set to enact in January an even tougher bill aimed to reduce the flood of spam, experts said that the ruling could encourage the state and local prosecutors -- and under the new law, private citizens -- to go after spammers more aggressively than before.

"Hopefully they will step up their efforts under the new statute," said David Kramer, a partner at Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich & Rosati in Palo Alto who has worked extensively on anti-spam legislation.

But the tough part could be yet to come.

Willis and Griffin did not respond to the suit, leading the judge to issue what's known as a default judgment. It is unclear whether the state will be able to collect the money.

"We are going to within reason pursue the avenues we have available to collect the judgment," said Tom Dresslar, a spokesman for the California attorney general's office.

Calls to PW Marketing in Canyon Country were not returned Friday. But Willis told the Los Angeles Times last year: "They can shut me down. I don't care. ... The worst thing they can do is get a civil judgment against me. I'm not dumb enough to keep any assets in my name."

Kramer said that it isn't surprising that Willis and Griffin have pulled a disappearing act. "A lot of these entities engaged in this practice are fly-by-night organizations," he said. But "if the defendant think that he can avoid the consequences of his actions by not showing up and claiming he has no assets, I suspect the attorney general will aggressively test the defendant's claim of poverty."

He added that the $2 million fine could also deter spammers in the future.

"That has to create some level of deterrence in the minds of unscrupulous marketers," Kramer said. "It's not just the fact of enforcement but the size of (the punishment that will get people's attention."

California's anti-spam law was challenged in 1999 and upheld in January 2002. Other states such as Washington have also started to go after spammers as consumers become increasingly frustrated by the amount of spam hitting their inboxes. A Pew Internet and American Life Project survey found this week that 52 percent of e-mail users say spam has made them less trusting of e-mail in general.




did you get that, We in Californication are starting to fuck spammers!!!

[Hamel]

Tougher anti-spam laws will not only save end users frustration, they also will save a ton of bandwidth.

[The Yosemite Bear]

Sorry I am sdtill gloating and hummming "I fought the law"

There's a thought make spam scammers actually have to break rocks in the sun or work on road crews..

my cal trans dollars at work...

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

The Sound of California LARTing the Spammers:

ThaWHACK!!

The Sound of Sweet Justice as the Spammers' Brains Fall Onto the Freeway Pavement Immediately After:

Splat!


It's about fucking time.

[Darth Wong]

I support the death penalty for spammers.

[SirNitram]

I support the death penalty for spammers.

DEATH BY BUNGA-BUNGA!

[Companion Cube]

I support the death penalty for spammers.

DEATH BY BUNGA-BUNGA!

Is that going to turn into a recurring joke here?

[Asst. Asst. Lt. Cmdr. Smi]

So, they were fined? Good. Hopefully, this means I'm one step closer to being able to check my e-mail and not find 20 ads related to dental plans.

[The Yosemite Bear]

well these were also the couple that spams other spammers and corprate account offering to get them the cheapest bulk Email publishing. They are the "Test case" worst spammers out there, this is the same one who sued the anti-spammers for posting their home address on the internet, who have said that use of worms and other Virii "are a legitamate business tool", that if you own a computer, they have the god given right to advirtise to you, weather you want to or not. I think based on what he's made over the last year 2mil is nothing. however this opens them up for further criminal charges, and based on his claimes that the use of worms are a legitamate business app. he's curently under invesigation by the feds in refrence to SOBIG.F

[Kuja]

The judge ordered the duo to pay $2 million in civil penalties and barred them from owning or managing a company that advertises over the Internet for 10 years without first notifying the attorney general.

YES!

Finally, we get the ball rolling. *begins humming Another One Bites The Dust*