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Judge In e360 Vs. Comcast Rules e360 a Spammer
Posted by
kdawson
on Fri Apr 11, 2008 10:43 AM
from the are-too dept.
from the are-too dept.
Brielle Bruns writes "Yesterday, Judge James B. Zagel dismissed claims against Comcast by e360. In the decision, the judge says: 'Plaintiff e360Insight, LLC is a marketer. It refers to itself as an Internet marketing company. Some, perhaps even a majority of people in this country, would call it a spammer.' This clears the path for Comcast's counter-suit." e360 is the spammer that got a default judgement against Spamhaus, as we have discussed on numerous occasions.
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Your Rights Online: Email Servers Will Choke, Says Spamhaus 576 comments
Rub3X writes, "The legal battle between antispam organization Spamhaus and e360 Insight is heating up. Spamhaus has a user base of around 650 million, and its lists block some fifty billion spam emails per day, according to the project's CEO Steve Linford. Spamhaus CIO Richard Cox says the immediate issue is that if the domain is suspended, the torrent of bulk mail hitting the world's mail servers would cause many of them to fail. More than 90% of of all email is now spam, Cox says, and he doubts that servers worldwide would be able to handle a ten-fold increase in traffic." Others estimate Spamhaus's blocking efficacy as closer to 75%; by this metric spam would increase four-fold, not ten-fold, if Spamhaus went unavailable. The article paraphrases CIO Cox as saying that the service will continue "even if there is a short-term degradation."
[+]
Your Rights Online: Judge Rules In Favor Of Spamhaus 232 comments
Waylon writes "U.S. District Judge Charles Kocoras has ruled in favor of The Spamhaus Project. e360 Insight responded on its homepage, saying the judge's ruling was 'a devastating loss of personal freedom for all U.S. citizens'. As opposed to shutting down a voluntary service which tries to mitigate the millions of unsolicited emails that e360 Insight pumps out every single day." From the article: "In his order, Judge Kocoras wrote that the relief e360insight sought is 'too broad to be warranted in this case' and that suspending the domain name would 'cut off all lawful online activities of Spamhaus, not just those that are in contravention' of the default judgment. He also called e360insight's motion one that 'does not correspond to the gravity of the offending conduct.'"
[+]
Appeals Court Tosses $11M Spamhaus Judgement 134 comments
Panaqqa writes "In a not unexpected move, the US 7th Circuit Court of Appeals threw out the $11 million awarded to e360 Insight and vacated a permanent injunction against Spamhaus requiring them to stop listing e360 Insight as a spammer. However, the ruling (PDF) does not set aside the default judgement, meaning that Spamhaus has still lost its opportunity to argue the case. The original judge could still impose a monetary judgement, after taking evidence from the spammer as to how much Spamhaus's block had cost them. This is unfortunate considering the legal leverage the recent ruling concerning spyware might have provided for Spamhaus."
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CvE (Score:5, Insightful)
Comcast vs. e360Insight: Whoever loses, we win.
Re:CvE (Score:4, Funny)
I say, "Go Comcast!"
Parent
Re:"positive business"? What are you smoking? (Score:4, Insightful)
Contrast that to e360, who provide a "service" that nobody wants at all. nobody wants e360 gone so that they can get service from a a different spammer, they want them gone because they don't want to be harassed by any spammers at all. Comparatively speaking, Comcast are saints.
To use a non-vehicular analogy, Comcast is a shitty hospital that provides poor service to the community but is operated and staffed by people with huge community interests and friends in high places, while e360 is a group of frat boys who are paid to steal stop signs so that (outstandingly) sleazy injury litigators can stir up more business in the area.
Parent
What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:5, Informative)
Still, the [i]majority[/i] of the costs are borne by the mailer, thus resulting in limites to the amount, and at least some specifivity. Not to mention that in order to get the best rates you have to identify yourself to the post office pretty well. This limits the amount of scamming that can be done as the scammers are normally stuck paying first class if they want to do anonymous drops. That increases costs to the point it has to be a very good scam or very selectively mailed if the scammer is to have any hope of making money and avoiding the postal police.
Parent
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:5, Informative)
Now I get essentially zero addressed junk mail.
Parent
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:5, Informative)
and I get practically 0 junk mail... One place to call/visit, as opposed to haveing to call capital one... amex... etc. etc.
Parent
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:5, Insightful)
The spammer shares the costs with the recipient's ISP, and ultimately the recipient (through increased ISP costs). The cost of any one individual spam is very low, but taken together they quickly become noticable.
The junk snail mailer pays for all of the mailing costs, but each piece of junk mail he sends must be recycled or thrown away, creating a small effect on the cost of garbage for each individual user. The cost of any individual junk mail is very low, but taken together, they do have an appreciable effect on the cost of trash collection.
Parent
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's sort of like paying $5 for a car and making somebody else pay the rest of the sticker cost for a luxury car. Yes technically they're both paying, but even street people around here can get their hands on $5 without too much trouble.
Trying to fight spam with legislation doesn't have a chance without global cooperation, and the Russians in particular just don't care, as do a few other nations. It's difficult to deal with places like the US where most of the spam originating from here is doing so from compromised computers.
Technical deterrents are difficult to get right, and while they do allow for some help, it's impossible to really fix it. It makes a difference, but with the current net architecture it's a challenge to stop spam and have anonymity as well.
Ultimately what things come down to is making it less rewarding. What we really need is the ability to fine companies that are paying spammers to advertise for them. Admittedly it would be nice to see spammers drawn and quartered, but realistically, it's far easier to find Target, Walmart, Bestbuy and the other companies I've seen advertised than it is to find a cyber criminal that may or may not be located somewhere in southeast Asia. It's just so much easier to follow the money than it is to try and follow the spam.
Of course that's going to be fought tooth and nail, and I'm sure there are other problems with it. But it's a far easier solution to the problem than the others are. Of course, that isn't a license to ignore the other parts.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Linhardt is claiming that with me. (Score:5, Interesting)
In their failed summary judgment motion (asking the court to dismiss the case based on some evidence), they claim that the spam I tracked to them is not theirs, but it must be someone trying to make them look bad because: 1. They don't spam; 2. That it could have been created in a word processor using publically available information; 3. They don't format their e-mails that way; 4. That it did not come from their IP addresses.
e360 ignored that they have used Atriks, which hides the true IP address by running it through a sort of legal botnet. They also ignored that they use anonymous domain name registrations, so I must have been a good guesser to get most of the domain names correct (their co-Defendant, Moniker, admitted that most of the domain names I identified to e360 were registered through them to bargaindepot.net -- their sister company/codefendant).
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I've read about some countires in Europe and other places placing a surtax on goods to handle the cost of disposal (for the packing materials only, IIRC). Maybe something si
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:4, Informative)
In municipalities that provide trash collection, the government ends up paying that part of the costs of direct mail advertising.
Parent
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:5, Insightful)
SPAM on the otherhand is advertising without the good. They dont support services that we want they are a burden on ISPs even the company who chooses to Spam reputation (albiet I havent seen a legit product being sold in years) will be shot. It really is a take-take indrustry that gives nothing back. At least tobaco comanies keep generations of farmers in business. SPAM operations run cheap make money without any benefit they are not a positive impact on the economy, they do no good.
Parent
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:4, Insightful)
-Rick
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
2. Feed junk mail to the goat
3. Drink the goat's milk.
4. Use the goat dung as fuel (Indian-style).
5. Eat the goat.
There are lots of good recipes for goat curry or jerk goat. They don't even mind the plastic envelope windows, and they save you the electricity that you would use to run a shredder.
Re: (Score:2)
With email spam, there are several stages where you can block the connection before the mail is delivered, thus reducing the cost to you. Not completely eliminating it, but reducing it. I know of no similar steps to take with snail spam.
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:5, Informative)
This will block 90%+ of junk mail, and I actually signed up months ago. The only junk mail I get is a local free newspaper that just gets stuffed into every box regardless.
http://www.dmaconsumers.org/consumerassistance.php [dmaconsumers.org]
This thing is pure gold. It will block ALL of those "pre-approved" credit card offers. You know the ones, they come with a 29.99% APR, a $650 limit, and yearly fees? Well, at least the ones my wife gets do. I signed up on this thing and I haven't had a single one since.
https://www.optoutprescreen.com/ [optoutprescreen.com]
Parent
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:4, Informative)
One: Verisign signature.
Two: http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/credit/prescreen.shtm [ftc.gov]
FTC.gov page about the website.
There are also some blog entries around the web where people have had the same feelings about the website and it's possibility of fraud. As always, do your own research. But it looks legit.
~Wx
Parent
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:4, Insightful)
Spammers, on the other hand, force their carrier -- Internet mail servers -- to bear 100% of the cost while receiving no compensation. Thanks to this, mail administrators are now forced to spend an enormous amount of time worrying about keeping spammers out, instead of making sure that the mail of legitimate users gets delivered. When I want to e-mail someone, I am less likely to be able to do so successfully since it's possible to get caught up in the antispam measures that have been set up on the mail server, as well as the recipient's mail client.
In sum: junk mailers pay their carriers, and contribute to the maintenance of the service. Spammers pay nothing to the mail servers, and are a significant detriment to the service.
They're both annoying as shit to the recipient, though.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
If I had my way, junk mail would be opt-in only as well.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
yes, there is. Form 1500.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Actually, if you add up all the energy that was ever used by computers and networks to send and receive spam, I'm sure it would probably involve a fair amount of pollution and wasted energy. What percentage of a random sample of internet packets travelling through an ISPs backbone is going to be spam related? Probably quite a lot..
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The other one is virtual. The energy it costs to deliver it to you is negligible, as is the required
energy to properly dispose of it. (hit delete)
Oh yeah, also if you have a decent spam filter you will RARELY get unsolicited emails.
There is NO DECENT FILTER for snail spam.
It costs money to power the antispam machines, the extra machines needed to process the mail that gets through and wasted time of people deleting it. I used to work for an ISP/hosting joint. Small mom and pop place. 1 server would have been plenty to deal with our load, except for the spam. a couple hundred domains spam going through our mailservers forced us to cluster up to 6 machines to deal with the filtering.
I can sort my snailmail spam from real mail in a couple seconds. With electronic spam I have t
Re:What's the distinguishing characteristic? (Score:4, Insightful)
Ok, so, let's see. The less customers USPS have, the lower the price for stamps?
If everyone sent 50 letters/day, the stamp price would be so high, it would be unthinkable?
Apparently I fail to follow this logic.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
It costs the USPS less to deliver junk mail than the mailer paid.
It costs the USPS more to deliver personal mail than the mailer paid.
Junk mail subsidizes personal mail.
You asked for it? (Score:2)
Official: e360 is a spammer (Score:3, Interesting)
Where does this leave spamhaus v. e360 though?
Re:Official: e360 is a spammer (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Official: e360 is a spammer (Score:4, Informative)
IANAL, but actually, that's not QUITE accurate. If Spamhaus had said to begin with that the US courts lacked jurisdiction, that would have been the end of it and e360 would not have won anything. However, Spamhaus claimed in state court that the suit belonged in federal court, thus acknowledging that the federal courts had jurisdiction. THEN they didn't bother to show up in court, and lost a default judgement.
Now, whether e360 can get anything out of them is another matter entirely, but they probably could have avoided the whole mess by denying the US courts had jurisdiction in the first place...
Parent
Seems like a fair judgement... (Score:3, Interesting)
It sounded like the judge said, basically, that the stated claims were invalid, but that the unmade claim of bad faith action by comcast may have a chance.
I've had several cases where comcast has silently blocked e-mail sent to me, where I specifically wanted to receive those e-mails.
If this is one of those companies that sends an advertisement with that little opt-out link at the bottom which is more likely to get you even more spam, then I'm all for Comcast blocking them. If this company (and I have not researched it, so I don't know much about it) does indeed require response to an opt-in e-mail prior to sending additional material, then comcast shouldn't be blocking them.
e360 aren't spammers. . . (Score:5, Funny)
Still, it's Comcast... (Score:2)
It's like seeing the grade school bully ace a math test.
Am I a bad person? (Score:2)
Is it wrong for me to hope that a meteorite falls on that courtroom and takes out both parties (but spares everyone else)?
I must conclude that you are a "bad person". (Score:2)
Kudo's to the judge (Score:2)
I'm still waiting for my judge to rule (Score:5, Interesting)
Entire details at http://www.barbieslapp.com/spam/e360/e360insight.htm [barbieslapp.com]
Their counterclaim is for calling libel (calling them a spammer and liar) and abuse of process (asking for their domain names in discovery). At the hearing struck/dismissed their abuse of process claim, and said that their paying my attorney fees for the motion is mandatory. The tentative did not strike the libel claim, but she said she would look into that further as the court needed to investigate if the supplemental request for judicial notice, containing articles quoting Linhardt in the press (Cnet and NY Times, DirectMag.com) is sufficient for limited purpose public figure status.
She denied their summary judgment motion on my claims against e360. Mostly because e360 refused to provide discovery to me, but relied upon that information in their motion. On the my libel claim against them, she denied that, except the portion saying that he implied that I hacked into his system.
Re:e360 vs Comcast? Yuck (Score:5, Insightful)
The spammers fought back so hard, they knocked the nation of Israel off the internet (where their offices/server was), for a few days.
The lesson? Spamming is big business.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Really, do you want to be known as the guy who harassed the spammer equivalent of the short-bus kid? Or do you want to go act out against the people generating 10-20% of all spam on the net?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
the Church of Scientology I dislike, not the people who simply believe in the underlying religious philosophy
What is the actual underlying religious philosophy? You're saying you don't mind the members but you hate the organisation? Is that something akin to not liking McDonalds, but you don't mind speaking to people who are stupid enough to consider their food worth consuming?
:p
Note: I do like other fast food places, just I always seem to end up with stomach problems after going to McDonalds, last time someone convinced me to go, I was off work for a few days.. and he was off for a couple of weeks