Fighting Spam Through Regulation and Economics

Bryan29 writes ""Next door to our offices was a spam operation... One day they weren't there anymore". Apparently in the past several months some black hat SEO companies (comment spammers) closed shop. Mr. Evron explores using a couple of case studies how spam was directly impacted by the UIGEA online Casinos law, disallowing payment processing, and how the subprime mortgage collapse made many former clients of spammers "move on". The article draws its conclusions from an economic standpoint "Perhaps the next step policy makers should take is to work to change this economy, possibly by legalizing and regulating ... More to the point, they can make the act of processing funds for this type of operation illegal.""

Well, DUH!

[www.sorehands.com]

It is obvious. If companies don't/can't make money from spammers, they won't pay spammers.

That is what I have been doing. I don't file lawsuits against the people pressing the send button, but the people who are advertised and making money as a result of the spam. A sex dating site I sued years ago, took a strong anti-spam policy after I sued them.

Spammers spam to make money. If people don't pay them to send the spam, they won't do. If a company will not make money from spam, they won't pay the spammer. The same thing happened with junk fax.

Re:This one is better, but no cigar

[TheRaven64]

That's a very separate issue. The WTO is involved because the US gambling laws discriminate against casinos not based in the USA. This wouldn't be an issue for anti-spam laws (they're about preventing spam, not just about preventing spam from non-US companies). The reason that they are involved in practice, rather than just theory, is that the US laws are having a real financial effect on organisations outside the USA, which is exactly what you would want to happen to spammers.

The Nature Of The Problem...

[DynaSoar]

... dictates the nature of the solution.

Spam is not simply a technological problem, so a technological solution will be insufficient.

Spam is in large part a social problem. It requires social solutions. If that requires legislation, so be it. Personally I enjoy tracking down spammers, and publicizing their real name and location, including a map showing where they are. To my knowledge nobody ever made use of these and tracked down a spammer, but it really fucked with their heads to be outed so thoroughly and so publicly. I had one call me and rant at me, including threats of legal action as well as threats of bodily harm. But I had a few call and apologize, claiming they weren't aware it bothered people so much. One of these, in fact, became an anti-spammer.