Spam, Milord 342
Your daily dose of spam... rjwoodhead writes "Hansard, the official journal of the UK parliament, reports on a recent discussion of spam in the House of Lords which not only mentions Monty Python, but reads like one of their skits." A New York spammer has been arrested. One account isn't scientifically representative, but it's a grim picture when you're showing a spam-doubling every 42 days. And an article in New Scientist suggests solving a puzzle, which is essentially the same idea as hash cash.
Bloody Vikings! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Bloody Vikings! (Score:3, Informative)
If a spam king and a spam queen have sex what do you get??
A.
A spamwich!
Ok, so it's a lame joke, but I still think it's funny..
Gotta love british humor (Score:5, Funny)
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, can the Minister think of a name for the enormous amount of unsolicited ordinary mail we receive?
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, when I have a moment I shall bend my mind to that question.
Re:Gotta love british humor (Score:5, Funny)
I expected them at any point to start murmuring rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb. (custard!)
Re:Gotta love british humor (Score:5, Funny)
Baroness Strange: My Lords, does the Minister agree that sardine tins and anchovy tins are also very difficult to open with their tin-openers?
At least they didn't flee to Oklahoma to avoid quorum!
Re:Gotta love british humor (Score:2)
Re:Gotta love british humor (Score:4, Informative)
I doubt she reads
(Number taken from here [privacy.net].)
Re:Gotta love british humor (inside joke?) (Score:4, Informative)
Um, "constituants"? This is the *House of Lords*. They don't *have* constituants, they aren't elected.
Chris Mattern
Re:Gotta love british humor (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Gotta love british humor (Score:3, Informative)
Reg article [theregister.co.uk]
USENET thread [google.com].
Re:Gotta love british humor (Score:3, Informative)
Please take note that this post is NOT a troll. the supermarket chain Sainsburys, owned by Lord Sainsbury, did indeed engage in spamming. The Register [theregister.co.uk] has the details. Check your facts before moderating please.
Re:Gotta love british humor (Score:4, Funny)
These spam laws are a waste of time (Score:5, Insightful)
Why waste time with legislation? A more permanent solution would focus on the technical - e.g., changing the protocol to forbid spam, etc.
Re:These spam laws are a waste of time (Score:3, Interesting)
Isn't that what they do with other forms of computer crime anyway?
Hell, a search warrent alone would put a spam business down and out pending tr
Mod Parent of Parent UP (Score:5, Insightful)
Besides the parent has a good point. The answer is not through legislation. What is to stop people from hosting their spam sites off shores [sealandgov.com] where they are protected from the laws. Kind of like the 809 Phone Call Scam [boycottwatch.org].
Re:Mod Parent of Parent UP (Score:3, Interesting)
As far as creating a system where only authorized people can send e-mail... well lots of luck... how do you determine who's authorized or not? Perhaps we *could* weed out any-old joe setting up a sendmail server on his local ISP, but what's to stop someone from using what is considered to be a legit authorized server to send spam?
I ca
Re:These spam laws are a waste of time (Score:5, Interesting)
Furthermore, the justification of a War on Spam is of a totally different nature than that of the failure that is Prohibition II. Almost all the problems usually attributed to drugs stemp only from their illegality. But Spam has until recently been quite legal and is now, as the Lords put it, 'choking the Internet'. Spam requires that the spammer be deceitful and intrusive to _everyone_ and actively waste their time, effort, and money. Plus the only people who get any enjoyment out of it are the ones directly making money off it, or think they are by hiring spammers. Drugs at least have the potential to be win-win for everyone involved.
My only real worry about arresting spammers is, like any other law, that it's going to be used entirely on the innocent or small fry and the schmucks actually clogging my inbox get off scot free. Or that even if we clear it up at home, we'll just get swamped by spammers from Asia (moreso than already, anyway) or whatver.
Re:These spam laws are a waste of time (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:These spam laws are a waste of time (Score:3, Interesting)
The real issues are the international issue and then the sheer magnitude of the problem. The individual States are strapped for cash. No AG office or law enforcement agency needs more work. Call a state communications commission and ask what they hear about... They will tell you that ALL they hear about all day long is telemarketing complaints. They are completely
Re:These spam laws are a waste of time (Score:5, Insightful)
spam, etc.
You get very few unsolicited faxes a day. Almost certainly, you have or had a business relationship with the fax-spammers, which means it's not truly unsolicited. You should fax them back (on the required number listed on the fax) and tell them to stop. No number listed? That's illegal, too!
Without the legislation, you and others would be receiving literally TONS of fax spam a month (yes, you can measure the mass when using faxes
The anti-fax-spam laws are absolutely NOT a waste of time. You don't know what you're talking about.
Puzzles = Waste of CPU cycles? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Puzzles = Waste of CPU cycles? (Score:5, Insightful)
The idea is to authorize the querying computer by giving them a problem to solve for which the answer is already known. Something like Folding@home involves puzzles for which the answers aren't yet known, so if the querying computer avoided solving it and just sent back a garbage solution the host machine wouldn't know the difference.
Re:Puzzles = Waste of CPU cycles? (Score:3, Interesting)
Ah, but if the problem to solve were simply to verify the computation of an already completed packet you would be solving a computationaly intensive problem *and* adding to the trust for a completed packet (assuming the same answer were obtained).
This would be two birds with one stone.
Also... (Score:2)
Not to be a wet blanket, but... (Score:5, Informative)
Seriously...the Buffalo spammer was almost trying to get caught, at this rate. The reason they got him is not because he's a scumbag spammer; it's because he brazenly engaged in identity theft. That just happened to be a tool that he then used to aid his spamming operation.
The article contains one or two references to the amount of bandwidth consumed by his activities, but so what? If it hadn't been for the identity theft, he'd be vilified on
Re:Not to be a wet blanket, but... (Score:3, Interesting)
well, if a spammer suses a fake return email address, a common paractice, and that address belongs to someone, they have committed identity theft. So it is spam related. I think its cool. this lets us trackdown spammer who are 'legitimate' , and thus filter them, and give the authorities a tool in which to capture the others.
Does the owner of abc.com own all the possible email address at abc.com? if so, just typing random
Um, what? (Score:5, Informative)
Also, I know we're not supposed to bitch about this, but it's a slow day at work and I'm bored: "2003-05-14 16:11:21 Buffalo Spammer Arrested for Identity Theft (articles,spam) (rejected)"
What does "solicited" mean? (Score:2)
Yeah, it's funny, but it raises a serious question: just what exactly does "unsolicited" mean in this context?
It seems to me that
Earthlink Abuse Department Rejoices (Score:5, Interesting)
The people pictured are from the Atlanta team, there's also a Pasadena team that is putting a picture together. From left to right they are: Tom Tatom, Kate Trower, Bobby Arnold, Beth, Milliken, Larry Fine, and Louis Rush. People in Atlanta not pictured include our team lead Erich Hablutzel, Brian Greer, and the departmental manager, Mary Youngblood. The Pasadena crew includes Laura Truchon, Kenn Wilson, Brad Patton, Brian Majeska, Jesse Kolbert, Kevin Phillips.
Today is a good day for all anti-spam activists!
Re:Earthlink Abuse Department Rejoices (Score:5, Funny)
A great looking bunch of people. Homocidal maniac looking people on the right (That dude on the far right would be the right one to send knocking on someone's door), technical looking people on the left (the guy on the far left looks like every FBI wirehead in every movie I've ever seen), and smack in the middle, Beth, who I now want to have my baby. (She should block her email for the next couple hours as geeks across /. try to dig up her address.)
What is it aboutt these departments that they all have an OB PIB (Person In Black) in them? Is there a new Affirmative Action law for goths and freaks (I say this, as the OB PIB in my department.)
Congrads to all of you.
Re:Earthlink Abuse Department Rejoices (Score:3, Funny)
I'm gonna take a wild guess and say it's "abuse@earthlink.com"?
Re:Earthlink Abuse Department Rejoices (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Earthlink Abuse Department Rejoices (Score:2)
Hey, that's not Larry Fine! THIS [3-stooges.com] is Larry Fine!
Not arrested for spamming (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Not arrested for spamming (Score:2)
Al Capone was arrested for tax fraud. **Shrugs** You gotta start somewhere. . .
Techincal Lords... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Techincal Lords... (Score:2)
I am kinda left with images of 70+ year old men sitting looking baffled in a half empty house of commons, prodding their neighbours and discussing under hushed voices what tinned meat has to do with these darn fangled computer contraptions.
Though to be fair my granddad used to be interested in the IT market at the ripe old age of 80, and would regularly clip out articles about the likes of Cisco and Microsoft, and
Re:Techincal Lords... (Score:4, Insightful)
Aside from the fact that they wouldn't be looking at a half empty house of commons (they sit in the house of lords) you've pretty much got it.
The Lords, though often befuddled and (let's be honest) asleep, do have some very bright people and have prevented some of the worst excesses of the commons throughout the years.
We have to be serious about humour (Score:5, Funny)
Monty's House of Lords (Score:5, Interesting)
Well sheesh, where do you think Monty Python drew their inspiration from? Your nostril?
The HoL discussions are pretty odd from an American standpoint (Hey! It's rude to interrupt! So quit it with your booing and hissing and here-hereing!), but at least most of the house is present during the debates. In the States, it's not uncommon to see a Congressman debating in front of a mostly empty congressional hall.
Re:Monty's House of Lords (Score:4, Insightful)
My bet is that the Lords are scared. They know perfectly well that Blair has an immense Commons majority and therefore could make mincemeat of them at a whim. He's already given them something of a bloody nose with the fairly limited reforms he's had so far. They face a near-absolute power that doesn't particularly like them.
How, then, can they save themselves? How can they stop Blair deciding to kick the whole lot of them out and install an elected or appointed second house? Answer: by appearing useful. If the Lords develop a reputation for being honest, for always turning up for debates, for standing up for the people rather than the corporations or the Americans once in a while... then Blair won't touch them, because that would be a disaster for him.
Personally, I think the Lords _should_ go, and be replaced with a proportionally-elected house, to complement the first-past-the-post Commons. But they're not all that bad as it is. That Hansard article was comedy gold :-)
Re:Monty's House of Lords (Score:2)
Say what you want about the britsh parliment, but they got style. Boored with the debate? Put your feet on the table. Dislike what the fellow is talkign about? Boo on him. Time for a vote? Ring bells like a victorian firebrigade and walk thru one of two doors.
It may be oldfashioned (the two sides are two swordslength apart I'm told, to stop the representatives from killing one another), but it works rather well at taking the will of the people and turning it into practical politics (as opposed to the will
Re:Monty's House of Lords (Score:2, Informative)
All that these "crazy" lords would be able to do is delay or return a piece of Legislation to the Commons. Woo - scary.
The British government works like this:
Re:Monty's House of Lords (Score:5, Funny)
Don't talk to me about parliamentary style.
Couple of weeks ago, I was invited to lunch at the House of Lords. Not something that happens to me often. In fact, not something that's ever happened to me before.
I actually thought about wearing a suit, and had intended to, but at the very last minute, there was a local train strike and so I decided that I couldn't be bothered as I knew I'd be travelling for ages.
It wasn't until I get through the peers entrance that it immediately strikes me that I've screwed up. This is the oldest gentleman's club in the world, and I'm wearing a polo shirt and chinos!
Anyway, the peer that I'm dining with shows up, and -- as is normal with British etiquette, she does her best to make light of it, telling people do this all the time, etc. and she hands me over to the usher to have him sort me out with the spare jacket and tie that they keep for these occasions.
Anyway, as soon as I'm out of her site, the usher starts to explain his philosophy on the world. This is a guy who dresses all day in a tailcoat and bow-tie. He tells me that when it comes to ties, he's something of a rebel. He believes that gentlemen should wear a tie at all times, and when he comes across sleazy little shits like me who don't bother with good grooming, he makes them pay.
So, when I'm finally escorted into the peers dining room, I'm wearing a dark blue shirt, a yellow paisley tie that should have been destroyed circa 1970, and an military-style blazer.
I've never really understood how it must feel to be a homeless person, but it all became clear to me that day.
Re:Monty's House of Lords (Score:2)
I always wondered... (Score:2, Interesting)
a)They are seeing an increase in profit with the more spam they send.
b)They are spamming more because of black lists and the such.
c)More people are just getting in on it.
or are their other reasons. As a side note...does anyone actually know a person who purchased something from a spammer? Not I.
Re:I always wondered... (Score:2)
This is it, probably. My 1998-vintage Hotmail account gets a veritable flood of spam, but MS recently had the filters improved and they cut out the vast majority. I don't know about false positives because what gets filtered is automatically binned, else I'd reach my storage limit in a couple of hours.
Of what gets through, most is from one penis spammer and one porno spammer. They each send the exact same spam several times a day. My guess is
Re:I always wondered... (Score:2)
Is it multiple copies from the same spammer, or is the "a
Re:I always wondered... (Score:2)
Looks like the same one. The spam is always identical, the techniques for avoidance always the same... Obviously it's hard to be sure when everything these days comes via the Far East, but I reckon it's the same spammer trying to increase his visibility.
The Answer is C (Score:2)
It's all these dinks who paid $39.95 to Don LePri and are determined to get rich quick that are the real SPAM problem.
Open letter to spammers (Score:5, Funny)
One account isn't scientifically representative, but it's a grim picture when you're showing a spam-doubling every 42 days
Dear Spammers,
Please slow down your spamming to doubling only every 18 months. This will give Moore's Law a chance to keep pace.
Thank you.
reverse checking on senders address (Score:5, Interesting)
http://lucifer.intercosmos.net/index.php?display=
And yes, it does store known "good" emails in shared memory so that all child processes can have access and know which emails are already allowed to send email.
The project is called honeymail as you can set it to "honeymode" so that when a spammer finds it and thinks it is an open-relay they start sending and everything just gets forwarded to spamcop, Occams razor etc..
Would love any ideas anyone has on honeymail.
Re:reverse checking on senders address (Score:4, Informative)
What you will need to do is to do a check agianst the first mailserver in the mail headers...however, this dosnt always work, because some companies place their mailserver inside the network, and then use a ssh tunnel to send to a mailserver outside the network...to prevent their mailserver from taking a hit.
all in all...it COULD work, but some niftly little tricks are needed first.
Re:reverse checking on senders address (Score:2, Informative)
Re:reverse checking on senders address (Score:2)
Re:reverse checking on senders address (Score:3, Informative)
Your server could easily create a situation in which the forgery is not a random, non-existent address, but is mine, or yours.
I've gotten spam and virii in our office with the 'from' line the same as the 'to' line, or the same as another user in our domain.
Spam Doubles every 42 days? (Score:3, Funny)
If you look into anything closely enough, you can find a relationship to that number.
Re:Spam Doubles every 42 days? (Score:2)
The best parts (Score:5, Interesting)
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, I am afraid that I have not been able to find out why the term "spam" is used, but that is the meaning it now has. It is a matter that should be taken very seriously because it not only clutters up computers but involves a great deal of very unpleasant advertising to do with easy credit, pornography and miracle diets. That is offensive to people, and we should try to reduce it.
Lord Faulkner of Worcester: My Lords, I can help the Minister with the origin of the word. It comes from aficionados of Monty Python, and the famous song, "Spam, spam, spam, spam". It has been picked up by the Internet community and is used as a description of rubbish on the Internet.
So, at least some in the House of Lords:
wish to be protected from having an email
equate easy credit with pronography with miracle diets
have heard of Monty Python.
I'd say that they compare quite favorably with the US Senate, so far.
[big snip]
Lady Saltoun of Abernethy: My Lords, do the Government have any plans to restrict unsolicited faxes? My fax paper is always being wasted by people who send me faxes I do not want. I do not know whether they could be called "corned beef" or something, but I have had enough of them
Clueless humor, I suppose, but humor.
[big snip]
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, can the Minister think of a name for the enormous amount of unsolicited ordinary mail we receive?
I wonder whether this was sarcasm or more clueless humor?
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, when I have a moment I shall bend my mind to that question.
Definitely sarcasm.
Re:The best parts (Score:5, Funny)
But she has enormous...tracts of land.
Re:The best parts (Score:5, Funny)
Clueless humor, I suppose, but humor.
No, actually quite sharp humour. If you go back to the menu of what the Lords were discussing that day, they'd just had an interesting discussion about corned beef, in particular when tinned, and how it can injure people. Link [the-statio...fice.co.uk].
Lady Saltoun of Abernethy: My Lords, is the Minister aware that if, having taken off one end of the corned beef can with the twisty thing provided-assuming that you have not lost it-you then take a common, ordinary, household tin-opener and take off the other end, it is very easy to push the corned beef out of the tin without any danger to yourself?
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: Yes, my Lords, I was aware of that, and I am very glad that that essential piece of information is passed round for the benefit of this House.
Re:The best parts (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not really sarcasm, as we understand it here in the UK. It's a polite attempt at urbane humour in the context of a debate most Lords would find rather perplexing, just as Lord Mackie's "request" was.
Re:The best parts (Score:2)
I'm surprised to see this. We already have the Fax Preference Service [fpsonline.org.uk] which you can register with, after which it's unlawful to fax you without prior consent. It works well, too - as does the corresponding Telephone Preference Service [tpsonline.org.uk] for normal phone calls.
My Lords, ... (Score:2, Insightful)
british humor (Score:2)
Good.. (Score:4, Informative)
I think we really need to start seeing more arrest with regard to spam...spam is getting to crazy and in some cases damaging levels. Just yesterday I had to hack up a few mailserv's tcp stacks in the kernels because they are reciving such a heavy load of mail (for approx 20000 users) that they were all starting to need rebooting every 2 weeks.
This isnt the sick part, the sick part is when i looked at the postfix logs, there was almost 5, 000, 000 pices of mail being delivered daily, and out of this, over 4,000, 000 were being bounced because they satisfied the requirements to qualify as spam.
Now I admit, this is more mail than most mailservers recive (this is a major mail system for a WAN, so it recives more mail than most --- and relays alot of mail for other networks ) but this is absloutly insane. 200 000 users are generating 5,000,000 pices of mail, and 4,000,000 of those are being bounced!
This means, the average user on this network is reciving 25 emails a day, and only 5 of these are being delivered. and 20 are being bounced because of spam.
Now if anyone says we dont need to throw a few spammers in jail for no other reason than just to make an example of them...well after seing this, you cant possibly belive that.
My favorite solution to date is to find the top spammer....kill him...video tape it and publish it on the web and say the #2 spammer is next!
The Question of Life, The Universe, & Everythi (Score:2, Funny)
Q: "How many days does it take for spam output to double?"
A: "42!"
Douglas Adams would be so proud...
-JE
-JE
ahh (Score:4, Funny)
The Best Solution EVER (Score:4, Insightful)
warm... (Score:4, Interesting)
Are Pseudonyms == Hiding Identity? (Score:2, Insightful)
$1 million in bandwidth (Score:5, Interesting)
If you generously figured 1$ per gig (in reality prices are a fraction of that), they're saying each e-mail was 1.21megs. If you go by more realistic prices, (25c/gig), you come up with 4.8 megs per message.
If you want to work the numbers the other way, earthlink is saying it costs them 1.21 cents in *bandwidth alone* to send an e-mail.
I'm calling bullshit on earthlinks "cost" of spamming. In reality I'll bet he didnt "steal" enough bandwidth for grand theft. (At my web host, 500$ would buy me 1.3TB of transfer).
Wether or not spamming is legal -- THEIR network allowed him to do it. They didnt notice a million dollars worth of bandwidth being pissed away ? Earthlink Buffalo didn't notice they were a million dollars less profitable this month/year and go WTF? Of course they didn't, they're lying through their teeth.
Multiple charging? (Score:2)
If the latter, probably every spam was charged for multiple times. At Earthlink, at the backbone, at the recipient's ISP, and then at the last mile to the recipient.
Don't forget CPU usage and storage space in addition to bandwidth.
It may be somewhat inflated, but it all adds up.
Math correction (Score:3, Informative)
This number *still* seems inflated for bandwidth alone, even considering multiple cycles per email (as the mail servers retry failed deliveries, deal with bounces, etc., which obviously are a far greater problem with spam than with normal email).
I would say that even though this number is likely inflated for bandwidth costs alone, to consider the total costs incurred by Earthlink you also have to consider space waste
House of Lords (Score:4, Insightful)
The Hon. Member is *not* a yappy cocker spaniel... (Score:3, Funny)
It fascinating to watch the 'Honourable Members' skirt the line between debate and personal insult. In the parliamentary system, if the Speaker/Chair thinks they've gone too far, they can call them on it and request they withdraw the offending statement. Dysfunctional as the B.C. Leg is, there were never any duels called on matters of honour. But this exchange [gov.bc.ca] between Moe Sihota and Fred Gingell back in 1
Imagine if Slashdot (Score:5, Funny)
Imagine if Slashdot read like this transcript.
Lord Johnny Mnemonic: My Lords, do you agree that the original post in this thread shall be labled a "First Post" and condemned as such?
Minister Cowboy Neal: Aye, and who will join me in moderating up all Natalie Portman posts?
The content would be the same, but it sure would be lot more polite...
Wierd out-of-context factoid thingy (Score:4, Funny)
The first bit, right before they talk about Intenet-delivered luncheon meat, said:
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, I totally agree. These statistics on accidents are extremely fascinating; they prove that the British public can use practically anything in this world to hurt themselves with. It is understandable that there are an estimated 55 accidents a year from putty, while toothpaste accounts for 73. However, it is rather bizarre that 823 accidents are estimated to be the result of letters and envelopes. It is difficult to understand how they can be the cause of such serious plight. I agree with the noble Baroness that it would be helpful if people paid careful attention.
Wow, over 125 accidents a year in the UK, just from putty and toothpaste alone!
Re:Weird out-of-context factoid thingy (Score:3, Funny)
Quotes include Baroness Sharples: My Lords, can the noble Lord say whether ring-pull cans are safer than ordinary cans which are opened with a tin-opener? Which is safest?
Re:Wierd out-of-context factoid thingy (Score:2)
Nitpick (Score:2)
Live Feed from the House of Lords (Score:3, Informative)
Intrigued by the House of Lords?
Check out this live feed [parliamentlive.tv] (in session until 4pm EST).
British Parliament (Score:2)
Hilarious! (Score:2)
My Lords, will the Minister explain how it is that an inedible tinned food that lasted for ever and was supplied to those on active service can become an unsolicited e-mail, bearing in mind that some of us wish to be protected from having an e-mail?
This is absolutely hilarious! Not only is he calling Spam (tm) the food product inedible, but he's completely confused about how it evolved into e-mail! Har!
'Tis true that Spam saved the troops in WWII, though.
Re:Hilarious! (Score:3, Interesting)
Think of it this way: Image the Senate populated by people who are all about the age of Strom Thurmond.
Some, despite thier advanced age are very knowlegeable of thier topic. Some are becoming increasingly bewildered in thier old age.
Spam -- it's the volume (Score:3, Interesting)
BUT -- when you look at the volume, the size of the message traffic, I was very surprised to see that my valid messages were only 3% of the volume -- 97% of the bytes sent to that hotmail account during April were either Spam or viruses!
May looks about the same!
Namaste-
Perhaps.. (Score:3, Funny)
Depending on how well he did, the e-mail could then be moderated - so that you could set a threshold based on the IQ of the sender.
Unrated email (IQ 0) would still get through, but would be very simple to discard - and after all, who really needs email from simpletons?
On a side note, would all non-English Slashdotters note that the proper English accent extends only to about 50 miles north of the Capital, and excludes the interior areas of most cities. This may help avoid confusion when visiting as saying 'methinks today is a radiant example of the beauty of the English countryside' to a resident of Hull would likley result in extrodinary ammounts of pain in the region of your genitals.
When will it be on C-SPAN? (Score:2, Interesting)
I guess a lot of us spammed Michael about this (Score:2)
Inquring minds want to know.
Aggregate cost of spam (Score:5, Funny)
Later that day... (Score:2)
Puzzles and CPU speeds (Score:4, Interesting)
confusing perhaps to a newbie... (Score:2)
Is he referring to unsolicited email or a canned, pork product? Either way, it's a problem.
A translation from Nob-speak to Slash-speak (Score:5, Funny)
What are their plans to reduce the growth in spam (unsolicited e-mails).
Translated: I am receiving seven hundred penis enlargement and shemale porn spams per day. This is becoming difficult to explain to Lady Mitchell.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville:
My Lords, I hope noble Lords will appreciate how I move seamlessly from corned beef to spam.
We aim to implement by the end of October this year the privacy and electronic communications directive. This includes requirements that unsolicited e-mails may be sent to individuals only for the purpose of direct marketing with their prior consent, except where there is existing customer relationship between the sender and the addressee. Consultation on the draft regulations started on 27th March and closes on 19th June.
Translated: look, I'm making a clever Spam joke! Aren't I a hoopy frood?
Just like the United States, we're planning on passing laws, but only rarely doing anything to enforce them.
Lord Mitchell:
My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Minister for that Answer. Unsolicited e-mails, known as "spam", now account for half of all e-mails in this country. In the United States, they account for 70 per cent. Spam, whether it is nuisance advertising or hardcore pornography is literally choking the Internet. Will the Minister expand on his Answer? Do the Government intend to follow the example of the United States Senate in introducing legislation specifically prohibiting unsolicited e-mails?
Translated: No, seriously, the long-schlong pills and he-she emails are a pain. What are you going to do about it?
Lord Sainsbury of Turville:
My Lords, we believe this to be a serious issue. The fact that a European regime has now been agreed implements the door to bilateral agreements between the EU and other countries, which is clearly very helpful. The European Commission is keen to pursue that.
There is now a big movement to stop spam in the United States. Twenty-six states have legislated and, although I do not believe that any action has been taken at the federal level, there has been a recent forum from the Federal Trade Commission on the subject.
We take the matter seriously. If measures are to be effective, it is vitally important that the international dimension is taken account of.
Translated: Well, nothing, really. I mean, if the EU does something, maybe, but come on, I mean, France is in the EU, right? How seriously are we going to take anything France is involved in?
Lord Renton:
My Lords, will the Minister explain how it is that an inedible tinned food that lasted for ever and was supplied to those on active service can become an unsolicited e-mail, bearing in mind that some of us wish to be protected from having an e-mail?
Translated: Me and Ned Ludd want to know what these "e-male" and "interweb" thingies are, and what they have to do with lunchmeat?
Lord Sainsbury of Turville:
My Lords, I am afraid that I have not been able to find out why the term "spam" is used, but that is the meaning it now has. It is a matter that should be taken very seriously because it not only clutters up computers but involves a great deal of very unpleasant advertising to do with easy credit, pornography and miracle diets. That is offensive to people, and we should try to reduce it.
Translated: Hell if I know. You really expect a bunch of pasty guys with thick glasses and technology fetishes to come up with a normal name? All I know is they say it's bad, so we should do something about it.
Lord Faulkner of Worcester:
My Lords, I can help the Minister with the origin of the word. It comes from aficionados of Monty Python, and the famous song, "Spam, spam, spam, spam". It has been picked up by the Internet community and is used as a descrip
What really stuck out to me (Score:2, Interesting)
(italics are mine for emphasis)
Not really a "spammer" prosecution. (Score:3, Insightful)
Ummmm.. Although he is a spammer, I think the fact that he stole people's credit cards and identities may be the real motivation for the prosecution.
Re:Karma Whoring (Score:4, Funny)
If I charged $1 to listen to a 30-second ad, I'd be making $120 / hour!!!
Then I could finally afford to get those penis and brest enlargement operations I always wanted!!
Re:It is very difficult... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:51st State, Great Britain (Score:2)
Re:Doubling every 42 days? I doubt it. (Score:3, Informative)