Bogus Spyware Scan Companies Held In Contempt Of Court
from the like-they-care dept
Earlier this month, we noted that the FTC had cracked down, yet again, on a company for putting up a bogus spyware scanner. The company would get people to their site where it would supposedly "scan" their hard drive for spyware. Of course, the scan was entirely bogus, and the scan would always tell you that your computer was rife with spyware. Then the site would tell you to buy its anti-spyware product for about $40. Of course, that anti-spyware product did absolutely nothing. The FTC ordered the company to shut down, but apparently the company is ignoring the order. It's now reached a point where a court has found the company in contempt and ordered it to pay $8,000/day until it complies. The execs in the company have had their assets frozen and the judge is now threatening to have them arrested. Sure, scamming may be easy money, but you would think these guys would at least shut down this operation and move on to some other bogus scam, rather than outright ignoring the court and the FTC.Update: Now it comes out that these sites are using URL redirectors via Microsoft and the IRS to make people think they're legit.
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Filed Under: contempt of court, spyware
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vmonde virus
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Personally, I have never seen a list of defendants in an action before a federal agency or a court quite as long as this one.
Interestingly, it appears the defendants' operations were fairly recently moved from the US to Belize, so I do have to wonder how the FTC and the court intend to try and enforce the TRO and the contempt order. Unless the defendants are deaf, dumb and blind, I rather doubt they would be foolish enough to leave all their financial assets sitting in financial institutions located within the jurisdiction of U.S. Courts.
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What I would like to see done to the purveyors of this crap.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywa07Iic8Zc
Yeah, that's what I would like to see done to the distributors of our collective pain. :D
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If Microsoft Windows wasn't so abysmally insecure, there wouldn't be a need for "anti-virus" software. MS is the enabler here.
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