Spam King Robert Alan Soloway Arrested!
If there’s one reason why my day has just become more efficient, it is because Spam King, Robert Alan Soloway has been arrested. Good riddance! This 27-year-old, who is accused of having sent millions upon millions of spam emails was arrested on Wednesday.
“He’s one of the top 10 spammers in the world,” said Tim Cranton, a Microsoft Corp. lawyer who is senior director of the company’s Worldwide Internet Safety Programs. “He’s a huge problem for our customers. This is a very good day.”
A federal grand jury last week returned a 35-count indictment against Soloway charging him with mail fraud, wire fraud, e-mail fraud, aggravated identity theft and money laundering.
Prosecutors say Soloway used computers infected with malicious code to send out millions of junk e-mails since 2003. The computers are called “zombies” because owners typically have no idea their machines have been infected.
I hope this sets a precedent and this damn spammer gets life in prison. This will hopefully get these spammers out of our emails as well as this website who receives hundreds of spam comments a week. If we have to fight spam all the time, then that just leaves us less time to write about our dirty ass politicians and government officials here in The Philippines.
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This is most interesting because of the precedent that it will set. Hopefully spammers will learn to fear prison time simply for using forged email headers, which inherently constitute fraud and identity theft.
I would very much like to see some convictions based on this notion that spoofing is identity theft and therefore a criminal offense. Spoofing is a very important tool for spammers.
There are so many ways to nail spammers that don’t involve fuzzy first amendment issues. It’s good to see some action being taken.
I hear ya Ken, these God-awful creatures who waste our time and even proliferate viruses and spyware through our emails really have to be stopped and I think that a high punishment and sentencing will help in lowering the incidents of spam..