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Anti-Spam Vigilantes And Just How Much Money Does Spam Bring In
from the welcome-to-anti-spam-day dept
In honor of "global anti-spam day" there are plenty of stories about spam out there (ok, actually, that's not true, there are plenty of stories about spam every day). The Wall Street Journal is running two stories that are a bit different. First is an article about online "vigilantes" who are tracking down spammers and spamming them back, using the same methods spammers use. As discussed in the past, I don't necessarily agree with this practice (though, I will admit there is something satisfying in reading about spammers having to deal with these attacks). On the flip side, we have the ever-popular Direct Marketing Association claiming that email marketing generates $7 billion in sales each year (hmmm... think they're a little biased?). Of course, most of this is through emails that people specifically requested. Though, the study does claim that 9% of people they spoke to are complete suckers - and have bought from spam.
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I love this quote!
"David Kramer, a Silicon Valley lawyer who has followed the spam issue, says many antispammer tactics are illegal. Crashing a data center by flooding it with traffic is certainly a form of trespassing and tampering with private property, he says."
So by that logic, when *I* get 150 of the same spam email and it shuts down my hotmail address for the weekend that's "free speech" right?
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