New Anti-Spyware Coalition Hopes To Be Less Useless Than The Last One
from the sounds-familiar dept
Just a few months after an anti-spyware coalition fell apart after it admitted known malware creators to the group, a new group has formed that promises it won't meet the same fate. They say the original group tried to do too much -- though, really the problem was just that they let the fox into the hen house. In the meantime, this more "narrowly focused" group plans to start out by "defining spyware." Good luck. People (politicians, mainly) have been trying to define spyware for quite some time, without much luck. The problem with defining such things is that you never know what the unintended consequences are -- and there are some actions that may be perfectly legit in some programs, but a serious problem in others. It's still not clear why existing fraud laws can't cover the problems caused by most malware. Besides, as we've seen with CAN SPAM, it wouldn't be surprising if many malware makers figure out ways to follow the letter of the law, but not the spirit -- or, failing that, to ignore it completely.
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Maybe don't define spyware
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