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Spammer That Sued Spamhaus Now Sued for Spamming

Posted by Zonk on Sat Mar 24, 2007 06:26 AM
from the i'll-have-the-spam-eggs-bacon-spam-and-spam-please dept.
Spam Government The Courts The Internet Communications News
Dave Q. Lintard writes with a link to The Register's coverage of a suit against the spammer that sued Spamhaus. e360 Insight, as the company is known, is accused of using a botnet and compromised headers to get their 'advertising' into the mailboxes of the claimant. These are also the folks that tried to get the Illinois courts to suspend SpamHaus's domain registration when they wouldn't play by e 360's rules. 'e360 Insight sued Spamhaus after the anti-spam organisation blacklisted its domains over alleged spamming. In a default ruling made by an Illinois court in September 2006, Spamhaus was ordered to pay $11.7m in compensation to e360 Insight, pull the organisation's listing, and post a notice stating that it was wrong to say e360 Insight was involved in sending junk mail. UK-based Spamhaus did not defend the case and the ruling was made in its absence.'
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  • > In a default ruling made by an Illinois court in September 2006,
    > Spamhaus was ordered to pay $11.7m in compensation to e360 Insight

    Let's all forward our spam to the judge responsible.

    • Re:The Ultimate .Forward (Score:4, Insightful)

      by klingens (147173) on Saturday March 24 2007, @06:36AM (#18469523)
      If a party doesn't show up to a court date and defend itself, the judge has to rule for the plaintiff. It's the law. Enforcing that decision is of course a different thing as spamhaus is still online.

      • Re:The Ultimate .Forward (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Bastard of Subhumani (827601) on Saturday March 24 2007, @06:43AM (#18469553) Journal
        That might well be the law. It might be relevant to this case too, if Illinois courts had jurisdiction over the UK.

        • Re:The Ultimate .Forward (Score:5, Funny)

          by Silver Sloth (770927) on Saturday March 24 2007, @06:54AM (#18469593)
          And the day that Illinois courts have jurisdiction in the UK we'll start throwing tea (or should that be Starbucks coffee) into the harbour.
        • Of course the USA courts had a choice. The court could have said "sorry, we have no jurisdiction" and that would be the end of it. IMO: too many judges have a "god" complex.

          • Re:Insanely arrogant USA judges (Score:5, Informative)

            by EveLibertine (847955) on Saturday March 24 2007, @09:21AM (#18470245)
            They didn't, at least not in this case. Spamhaus requested that the case be handled by this court. They chould have let it go to any court, then argued that whichever court it was had no jurisdiction, or let the court decide whenever it was handed the case that it didn't have jurisdiction. But that's not what happened. By requesting a specific court, it appeared that Spamhaus was going to actually fight the merits of the case, which would have waved jurisdiction arguements. So, to any court handling the case at this point, it would appear that Spamhaus was going to accept U.S. jurisdiction. But Spamhaus was just moving it to a court that they knew didn't have jurisdiction so that they wouldn't even have to show. I don't know why they didn't just let it go to any court, state or federal, and then claim grounds of no jurisdiction. Maybe their lawyers thought they might run into trouble in U.S. federal courts or something, and thought they had better chances of going this route. Nevertheless, the decision was Spamhaus', not any judge with a "god" complex.
            • Spamhouse requested that this case be handled by the court.

              This statement requires substantiating evidence.
            • But reposting [spamhaus.org] Spamhaus' own statement here seems reasonable. I hadn't read it before today myself.

              A SLAPP lawsuit filed in an Illinois (United States) court by David Linhardt (aka e360 Insight LLC) against The Spamhaus Project Ltd., a British-based non-profit organization over which the US court had no jurisdiction, went predictably to default judgement when Spamhaus did not accept U.S. jurisdiction.

              To get the lawsuit case accepted in Illinois, instead of filing in the correct jurisdiction (United King

      • IANAL but I don't think the judge should rule for anyone if either plaintiff or defendant is outside the judges jurisdiction. And as Spamhaus isn't US based, they're outside of the judges jurisdiction.

        The only thing they can't sensibly do now is set up business on US soil, but why would they need to do that?
        • Very dangerous, as it allows any company which primarily does sketchy business in the US to have a mailing address in, say, Malaysia, and designate that their headquarters. Then anybody they do business with is in the US, and thus cannot sue them.

          In a world where international business is allowed, there really needs to be some provision for international lawsuits.

      • If a party doesn't show up to a court date and defend itself, the judge has to rule for the plaintiff. It's the law. Enforcing that decision is of course a different thing as spamhaus is still online.

        But the judge could have also said they have no jurisdiction. Or tossed it out based on stupidity of the claim.

        What will be interesting is California judge is in jurisdiction of e360 and there is not much doubt in my mind e360 sent this guy spam.

        Lets hope the CA judge tosses e360 and its operators into the po

        • Jurisdiction has already been determined. (Score:4, Informative)

          by www.sorehands.com (142825) on Saturday March 24 2007, @12:14PM (#18471497) Homepage
          I am the one who filed suit against E360Insight and Linhardt [myspamsuit.com].

          Courts already ruled that spammers can be sued where the spam is received (known as the effects test from Calder v. Jones, 465 U.S. 783, 804 S. Ct. 1482). My successful brief agaainst a porn spammer is here [barbieslapp.com].

          Additionally, E360's sister business (http://www.bargaindepot.net) specifically programmed their web site to take orders from California (via drop down lists).

          I don't think that any motion by them saying that there is no jurisdiction over them in Califonia, but they have jurisdiction over Spamhaus in the UK will pass either the smell test or the laugh test.

    • Re:The Ultimate .Forward (Score:5, Insightful)

      by asninn (1071320) on Saturday March 24 2007, @06:54AM (#18469587)
      It was a *default ruling* - Spamhaus didn't have anyone show up for the trial, so they lost by default, and I'm pretty sure the judge didn't have much choice in that regard.

      I can certainly *understand* Spamhaus, of course; if somebody sued me in another country, I wouldn't fly there just to attend a trial, either, and I'd certainly ignore the verdict (why do they think they'd have jurisdiction over me, anyway?), but the rules are still the rules, and the judge just did what the rules said, so don't blame him.

      • Re:The Ultimate .Forward (Score:5, Funny)

        by BillGatesLoveChild (1046184) on Saturday March 24 2007, @07:12AM (#18469657) Journal
        I thought the fun thing about Common Law is judges are allowed to make it up as they go? The Judge could have, in absentia, still found for Spamhaus and sentenced the Spammers to death by hanging. It would have been worth it to see the look on their faces. :-)

        It would have of course been overturned on appeal. Maybe.
      • if memory serves me correctly, e360 stated the spamhaus had an office in the United States,and without any further testimony from spamhaus, the court had to except that as true. Now if Silverstein's suit is successful, and e360 is convicted of a spamming charge, spamhaus can appeal and it will pretty much be a slam-dunk and might even get some damages.
    • Let's all forward our spam to the judge responsible.

      Let's not send him all our spam. Just send him the spam from e360 insight that was relayed through a forign bot (against US can-spam law) since he has openly denied in court he is not doing this.

      Let the mountain of fraud evidence stack up on the judges desk.

      Then net the judge know by snail mail that Spamhaus can help with the problem of unwanted junk mail by deciding on using their advisory list to filter their own mail.

    • Better yet, lets all forward our spam to e360 contact form. Please feed me spam [e360insight.com]!

      • Re:The Ultimate .Forward (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Don_dumb (927108) on Saturday March 24 2007, @07:56AM (#18469813)
        That might all well be true BUT the U.S. courts can do all they want, Spamhaus are in the UK. And are literally outside of the jurisdiction of the US court. No one should be forced to travel to another country just to say they don't work in that country.
        Surely when the writ (or whatever it is called) was registered, the address of the people they were suing (the UK) should have made it clear that they were trying to sue someone they had no right to. IMHO a court system shouldn't process a litigation without an address of the defendant in the jurisdiction of the court system.

        • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

          by EveLibertine (847955)
          Agreed, no one should be forced to travel to another country to say they don't work there. But, you seem to imply that Spamhaus was somehow forced to represent themselves in this case. They weren't, and they didn't even show up anyway. In the end of it all, they'll probably wind up counter-suing for legal costs incurred over the whole venture. About your idea with court systems not processing litigation. I don't know about this. If a court thinks it doesn't have jurisdiction, it should just get bumped up t
        • Countries have been invaded for less.
      • No, if you want to contest jurisdiction in US courts, the best means is to actually do so, if necessary by means of a special appearance for that purpose so that you don't inadvertently waive the point. So long as you follow the right procedure, it's entirely possible to argue jurisdiction and to argue the merits of the case. Ignoring the court is not a good way to go about things.

  • Best possible result would be... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by jcr (53032) <jcr@mac.STRAWcom minus berry> on Saturday March 24 2007, @06:33AM (#18469513) Journal
    He wins, gets a judgment that sends the fuckers into bankruptcy, someone buys the judgement against Spamhaus from the recievers for $1, and donates it to Spamhaus.

    -jcr

  • Factual inaccuracy (Score:5, Informative)

    by Looce (1062620) on Saturday March 24 2007, @06:42AM (#18469549) Journal

    Default judgments obtained in U.S. County, State or Federal courts have no validity in the United Kingdom and can not be enforced under the British legal system. A Plaintiff seeking to have such an order enforced must re-file the case in a British court of law and prove jurisdiction, as well as the small matter of proving the merits of the case, all of which were in this case bogus and would not have stood up in any court if tested. Spamhaus had advised Mr Linhardt from the start that a U.S. judgement would be invalid outside of the United States and that he would need to re-file his case in the United Kingdom. Spamhaus understands that David Linhardt does not wish to file in the United Kingdom because his activities are illegal here.
    With source [spamhaus.org], of course. Emphasis mine. The entire document linked here is worth reading.

    TFsummary failed to mention this.

      • Re:P.S. This is old news (Score:5, Funny)

        by AndroidCat (229562) on Saturday March 24 2007, @07:50AM (#18469787) Homepage

        Please post your email address, and we will opt you out of further news on this topic.

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  • Not being upheld in the UK aside, didn't they have proof to show the courts the company in question did in fact use underhanded illegal tactics to achieve it's advertising? I ask cause, not only did they lose but they were forced to de-list the company and basically apologize. It doesn't make sense. When a sex offender is caught, and proof given, they are put on a list and basically not removed, hell the list updates whenever they chose to relocate and such. So why could a spammer, just have this twisted ar
    • Not being upheld in the UK aside, didn't they have proof to show the courts...

      It was more important to establish the point that the US judicial system is not a "world court" able to haul anyone in at a whim to spend a small fortune defending themselves against spurious actions which should never have reached a trial. The fact that the judge was a total moron who was unable to see through a pathetic tissue of lies shows how dangerous it would have been to have allowed any person from Spamhaus to become a lit

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by EveLibertine (847955)

        The fact that the judge was a total moron who was unable to see through a pathetic tissue of lies shows how dangerous it would have been to have allowed any person from Spamhaus to become a literal captive hostage in the US while this was being sorted out.

        Look, don't call the judge a moron. He's not. I can't bring myself to call you a moron, though you are obviously ignorant of the facts here. The way the courts work here, and in most other countries, is that the courts assume that they have jurisdiction.

        • Okay, so let me get this straight. You see no issue with the fact that I, as a "defendant", should have to spend large amounts of time to travel overseas, and / or engage the services of a lawyer overseas, in order to tell a court that has no jurisdiction over me that, gasp, it has no jurisdiction over me?

              • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

                by EveLibertine (847955)
                Wrong, language is merely a mode of transporting meaning. You understood, thus my language was sufficient.

                It may not have been perfectly accurate, but I admitted the mistake in my previous post, so your making a further fuss of it is rather unwarranted. Furthermore, if you didn't care what I meant, why did you bother to correct it? You certainly could have been more kind or civil about it, or at the very least been constructive and offered the correct terminology. You over-reacted, you got called - get over
              • In which case, Spamhaus should be looking at malpractice proceedings against their representation. This is a fairly elementary, black and white thing that a reasonable person should be able to presume competent legal counsel would be able to interpret correctly.

                Of course, if it's anything like most countries, the simple fact that most politicians are lawyers and don't like the idea of other lawyers that they used to work with being sued have made it either extremely difficult, or waived responsibility for

      • Well in most cases what you have to do is actually read the law, most start out something like "it is illegal for anyone in the United States to ...." and if that's the case your right the US can't impose jurisdiction; on the other hand if the law reads "it is illegal for anyone to ...." and a SEAL team snatches your ass off the street in your country and when the blindfold comes off your in the United States your screwed! Don't forget if the US is going to spend that kind of resources on you, there are pr
        • If Spamhaus were worried that any of their people might get served in the US, they could have spent the $10,000 or so to have the suit tossed out on jurisdictional grounds.

          Why? I suspect that Spamhaus has better things to spend $10,000 on than a lawyer's bill in another country.

          If you were suddenly served with a summons to appear in court in Mogadishu, would you immediately hire a Somali lawyer and send him $10,000 to defend you? Or would you, like most of us, simply say, "Ridiculous!" an
  • For some reason, TFA has a rogue space in the link to the spammer's press release [e360insight.com]

    "The court's ruling today is an important step in defending the rights of legitimate marketers," said Dave Linhardt, e360's President and Founder. "Amazingly, Spamhaus continues to believe it can operate above the laws of the United States. Based on Mr. Linford's refusal to comply with the permanent injuction, it is my opinion that Spamhaus is nothing more than a vigilante, cyber terrorist orgainzation with a dangerous God com

      • Last time I checked, US laws mostly only apply inside the US, but maybe the Bush-empire grew while I was sleeping?

        Apparently it has. We now have this little vacation spot in Cuba.
  • I know spamhaus technically lost, but did they pay? If Spamhaus decided not to pay, what could e360 do?

    • Spamhaus didn't pay, and nor will they.

      e360 is a spammer, and they will never obtain judgment against Spamhaus in a UK court. (Because they are a spammer. So sue me, e360.)

      • Nevertheless, any Spamhaus employee risks their freedom by entering the USA till this ridiculous ruling holds.
  • Wow, I read through the comments posted so far, and in 3-1/2 hours, only one [slashdot.org] talks about the Silverstein v. e360 lawsuit, which is the article posted (lending proof that Slashdotters don't RTFA) :).

    All the comments are on the e360 v. Spamhaus suit. Understandable, since the summary doesn't even talk about the linked article either.
    • The law firm handling Silverstein's suit posted on SPAM-L trumpeting the news and linked to their filing. It reads like it was written by a Slashdot editor. It's one guy who wants to represent himself as a service provider (perhaps his wife gets her mail from his system, who knows) and hired a bunch of divorce lawyers for the suit. Normally I wouldn't lay very good odds on him, but e360's Dave Linhardt (e360 *is* Linhardt, it's just one lone chickenbone spammer) has quite a history of shooting his mouth

  • Careful what you say online about E360... (Score:5, Informative)

    by merc (115854) <slashdot@upt.org> on Saturday March 24 2007, @01:14PM (#18471983) Homepage
    The Usenet newsgroup news.admin.net-abuse.email (aka, NANAE) is wonderful for watching E360INSIGHT's Lindtard CEO try and support their suit against Spamhaus, as well as read Spamhaus' Steve Linford rationally explain themselves. Various posters to that newsgroup have outed E360 for spams they have received in the past and present.

    Recently E360INSIGHT have filed a suit against those same people, likely for defamation (or libel, not sure). However it's worth noting that they feel they can use the law to suppress anyone who wishes to refer to them as spammers.

    The old saying still rings true, that spam is continually being redefined by the spammers as "that which we do not do".

    http://spamresource.googlepages.com/e360vFerguson. pdf [googlepages.com]

    • "Recently E360INSIGHT have filed a suit against those same people, likely for defamation (or libel, not sure)."

      Well, then make sure you call them by their name: "SPAMMERS [e360insight.com]
    • This is confusing. Russia right now is a big *source* of spammer operations that infest Windows machines and lease time on them to spamming companies. They have sharp programmers and no enforcement of computer security abuses to speak of, and an active criminal underground to launder the money through.

      Killing them doesn't seem to be all that helpful so far.
      • No, you are right in that sense. Killing is worse than spamming. But that does not prevent me from making jokes about it? But don't dawdle, the USSR is get much further ahead of you! Something must be done! Think of the children!

        • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

          by AJWM (19027)
          Killing is worse than spamming.

          That's arguable. In terms of aggregate life-minutes lost, spamming is probably a lot worse than a couple of killings.

          (Take a 75 year lifespan, that's 60*24*365*75 = 39,420,000 minutes. Send enough spam that 10 million people spend 5 minutes each dealing with it, that's 50,000,000 minutes lost. And there's a lot more spam than that.)

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Our court systems have been jammed with bullshit since the day they allowed people to blame others for their own irresponsibility.

      It's time to start holding people accountable for their own actions again. Stop the pandering. Stop the bullshit.

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