MySpace Sues ‘spam king’ and Emerges Victorious

Notorious spammer, Sanford Wallace, also called the 'spam king' has frequently been blamed for sending annoying e-mails.

In one such instance, social networking site, MySpace, which sued Wallace for failing several times to present documents or to appear before the court, has come out victorious in the legal fight against the spammer, as reported by CNET News on April 28, 2008.

MySpace filed the lawsuit in March 2007, alleging that Wallace ran a phishing scheme to harvest the login credentials of MySpace. He was also accused of targeting MySpace users with spam mails that tried to lure them into going to gambling and porn-related Websites. Wallace launched the scam in late 2006, and made a net earning of $555,850, according to the records from the US District Central Court in California.

According to papers filed on April 15, 2008 with the US District Court in California, Wallace was asked several times to present documents on request of MySpace, and to furnish a declaration.

But during each of these times, MySpace waited and Wallace failed to accede. At first, Wallace informed MySpace that he was unable to find a legal advisor, as reported by CNET News on April 28, 2008. Then, shortly later, he said that he was not aware of the dates for his court appearances. He also said that since he was neither accepting mail nor signing for parcels, he missed the notifications sent to him.

The court, however, did not consider his reasons as acceptable, so gave him more opportunities to comply. But none of them worked. After Wallace repeatedly failed to meet the deadlines or show up, the court passed a judgement against him on grounds of failure to act.

The MySpace move is the latest lawful claim against Wallace, a spam emperor, turned spyware operator. Other suing parties against Wallace are the Federal Trade Commission, and companies like Concentric Network Corp. and America Online. In May, a federal judge ordered Wallace and his firm, Smartbot.net, to pay up $4,089,500 in wrongfully gained earnings.

MySpace, just like other online companies, is fighting to protect its service from abuse. The company has also legally charged Scott Richter for violating federal and state anti-spam laws.

Related article: MySpace Wants Apple To Update QuickTime

» SPAMfighter News - 5/3/2008