Spammer Gets $11 Billion Fine 478
Spad writes "It's not a typo, The Inquirer (amongst others) is reporting that an Iowa-based ISP has been awarded $11.2 billion in a case against spammer James McCalla, who was found guilty of sending over 280 million illegal spam emails. Under state law, the ISP was entitled to $10 per illegal e-mail sent. According to the Quad-City Times, McCalla has also been banned from using a computer for 3 years. From the article: "CIS acknowledged that it is unlikely to see any of the judgment money but said that it was time that spammers learnt that their actions would result in an economic death penalty"."
Re:Bankrupcy? (Score:1, Interesting)
Unfortunately the net effect of this will probably be a change in the law, since the courts will see a $11+ billion settlement as a mockery of the court system.
Would love to see more of this (Score:3, Interesting)
Banned From Using a Computer (Score:2, Interesting)
I can get mired in technicalities, it is obvious the judgement refers to a personal computer. But that line does get fuzzy. Does an iPod count? A PDA? A cell phone?
Also, given how essential computer use is nowadays, this almost infringes on barring the pursuit of life, liberty yadda yadda. Yes he committed a crime, but it is almost to the point where essential tasks cannot be performed, but on a pc. And in three years, who knows.
Re:Bankrupcy? (Score:5, Interesting)
Let's see... $11.2 billion, at the highest tax bracket of 35%, that's $3.92 billion he'll owe the IRS.
IRS publication 525:
Canceled Debts Generally, if a debt you owe is canceled or forgiven, other than as a gift or bequest, you must include the canceled amount in your income. You have no income from the canceled debt if it is intended as a gift to you. A debt includes any indebtedness for which you are liable or which attaches to property you hold.
If the debt is a nonbusiness debt, report the canceled amount on Form 1040, line 21. If it is a business debt, report the amount on Schedule C or Schedule C-EZ (Form 1040) (or on Schedule F (Form 1040), Profit or Loss From Farming, if the debt is farm debt and you are a farmer).
Re:Real justice? (Score:2, Interesting)
IANAL, but I'm guessing forging the ISP's address in the header has something to do with it. Seems perfectly fair to me; it's not legal to forge someone's signature in meatspace either.
Pointless (Score:5, Interesting)
From QuadCity Times: The lawsuit claimed that McCalla sent more than 280 million illegal spam e-mail messages into CIS's network...
He claimed that under state law in effect at the time, he was entitled to $10 per illegal e-mail.
Kramer said then that he likely will not see any of the judgment money.
Then what precisely, would be the point? If the claim is that this will somehow economically damage a spammer, when in fact not even a single dollar may be paid out ultimately to the aggrieved party. Not to mention the ruling is in Iowa but the spammer is in Florida, so there may be jurisdictional disputes, reciprocity or not.
This is merely smoke and mirrors, to make some people feel like they are doing their part in the war on spam. I don't see spam drying up. It seems to be getting worse. There has to be a real crackdown, perhaps even prison time if any inroads are to be made.
Wake me when they string this spammer up to a tall tree by his thumbs.
Re:Ouch silly sentence (Score:3, Interesting)
The lower the risk of being caught, the larger the penalty assessed has to be to compensate. Obviously, as in this case, there are functional limits. The size of the penalty, past some point, makes no difference; it spells economic death for the penalized. Simultaneously, people are very, very bad at assessing risk in personal decisions, so there's a floor beyond which the risk is too small to make up in penalty, regardless. Spam, unfortunately, is still in the category of "risk too small to worry about" crimes.
But that's the thinking behind the sentence. Obviously, an $1.1E10 fine is just hand-waving in terms of this particular case; this is just to set the stage, as it were.
Re:Ouch silly sentence (Score:3, Interesting)
How about 1 second of community service for each illegal e-mail, based on the amount of time he's wasted of someone else's life. Something like 15 years of picking up trash would seem fitting.
Re:About right, I guess (Score:2, Interesting)
By economic death penalty they must mean... (Score:3, Interesting)
By economic death penalty they must refer to something that is never actually carried out, delayed by infinite appeals and more for show than anything else. They'll never get a dime of those billions, the spammer will continue to spam (check out http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200 5601040360 [freep.com] - if the legal system won't do anything about a woman who was caught three times driving with a suspended license to her probation officer they won't do anything significant about a spammer) and people like me will lose ever more faith in the system.
We have people awarding impossible fines with full knowledge that they will never be recovered (ie: they knowingly refused to mete out justice since their "justice" is only something that exists on paper and in their fantasy world). We have judges who order restraining orders against David Letterman because somebody claimed he was using psychic powers to harass her. We have people who will devote months of their lives to sit on juries and render verdict even though everybody knows from the start that what the jury says is irrelevant because everything gets rewritten on appeal anyway.
The system is broke. The overlords of the system don't care; these people have much less respect for the law than the criminals they try in their courts.
Re:Bankrupcy? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I would rather that... (Score:3, Interesting)
And, that is just for the amount of emails that he got caught spamming. Also, some people spend less than 5 seconds deleting spam emails and some people spend more.
Re:I would rather that... (Score:2, Interesting)
Example:
4oz of Pot = 25-life Years in jail
Forcing a Child to preform a sexual act on camera = 15-30 Years in Jail
1 Count of Child Molestation = 10-20 years in Jail
Murder = 25-Life Years in Jail
If they are smart. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Not exactly... -- more (Score:3, Interesting)
Finally! (Score:4, Interesting)
This might be a good turning point, especially with these ridiculously silly amounts which actually do mean that life, economically, is over for you. Everything the guys ever earns above and beyond whatever the minimum-for-life-that-you-can't-legally-take-away is in his jurisdiction will go poof, for the rest of his years.
In other words, the spam equation just changed from "make tons of money, if caught, lose some and continue" to "make tons of money, if caught you're pretty much dead". That's a different game.
Re:Finally! (Score:4, Interesting)
Second, bankruptcy costs a few hundred bucks. If the spammer has any other significant debt, this judgement will actually do him a favor by clearing all his debt out.
The net effect of this will be zero, or actually enable the spammer to expand his operation with upgraded equipment.
Re:Bankrupcy? (Score:5, Interesting)
Either way, though, the law did exactly what it was intended to do---send a message to people who flagrantly violate the law, ethics, and basic human decency in a way that irreparably harms the general public. As such, it isn't a mockery of the court system. It is reasonable enforcement of a reasonable and just law.
More to the point, there's no way that this person could reasonably claim not to have known that spamming is illegal, harmful to a free society, and offensively unethical. Thus, this behavior can only be classified as sociopathic. Now $11 billion probably qualifies as grand larceny, so with a little luck, this will end up resulting in incarceration of the person for failing to remit the court-ordered sum. This is exactly what should happen.
Mass spammers like this are, IMHO, a danger to society, no different from terrorists threatening to blow up part of the power grid. They consume vast amounts of resources for illegal purposes, defrauding the public of those resources. As far as I'm concerned, prison would be a good start, followed by institutionalization or long-term psychotherapy, depending on the results of thorough psychological testing.
Write your congressmen and women and demand that the judgement be tripled.
Interesting... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Bankrupcy? (Score:2, Interesting)
Makes you wonder if other spammers feel like the water is getting any hotter. I know that someone out there is smart enough to circumvent just about anything, but you have to believe most spammers are fairly unsophisticated joes who are just getting away with it for now. My hope is that it becomes too risky and expensive for spammers to operate and they just look for other ways leech.
Re:It might as well be a 40-zillion dollar judgeme (Score:3, Interesting)
OK, so let's do a scenario. You own "Divide By Zero's Friendly Software Store" and I own "Alizarin's Discount Software, Bowling, and Small Appliance Emporium." I don't like the fact that you get more business than I do, so I contract a spammer under the table (and possibly by saying I'm you) to send out some spam advertising your company's mail-order services. Somebody reports it, and your company, as the supposed initiator and advertiser, is fingered. So you get fined/shutdown/whatever, and I laugh all the way to the bank.
I do make some assumptions about evidence, but still, is it really that far fetched?
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:If they are smart. (Score:5, Interesting)