Spamford Wallace Surrenders To The FBI; May Finally Go To Jail
from the wow dept
If you're an internet "old timer" who paid attention to the early "spam wars," you know the name of Sanford "Spamford" Wallace. While plenty of people have been described as "the spam king," he was the original kingpin (starting in the junk fax business, and then moving on to email in the mid-90s). He was proud of being called the spam king... but after the business started to become risky, he claimed that he "retired" in the late 90s, and (partially) owned a nightclub. However, the lure of the spam was apparently too much. He jumped into the spyware business and ran into trouble with the FTC. Things got weird when Wallace disappeared and his lawyer asked to withdraw from the case, noting that he couldn't reach Wallace. Wallace was hit with a massive fine from the FTC, which it appears he ignored.He then moved on to spamming MySpace, which got him sued. His strategy was established: he just ignored the lawsuit. The end result? A $234 million fine. Of course, MySpace went downhill and up came Facebook. Facebook sued him in 2009 and won an astounding $711 million. This time, Wallace actually did show up in court, but claimed he was totally bankrupt. We wondered, at the time, if there was actually anything that could be done to stop him, since he seemed to just keep on spamming, and the fines (and some of the cases themselves) being issued against him were just ignored. There were some questions two years ago if he'd finally be brought up on criminal charges, and it appears that's finally happened.
Wallace apparently surrendered to the FBI after an indictment last month. He's now facing 40 years in jail and a potential $2 million fine (which seems like nothing compared to the earlier fines).
Some of the details in the article also suggest that Wallace simply couldn't stay away from Facebook, despite a court order not to access the site at all:
Wallace, who was ordered by U.S. District Court Judge Jeremy Fogel in 2009 not to access Facebook, was also charged with violating that order by accessing the social network on an airline flight from Las Vegas to New York in April 2009 and by maintaining an account under the name David Sinful-Saturdays Fredericks for a few weeks earlier this year.I will say that 40 years sounds excessive. However, it also seems clear that he has no interest in following the law when it comes to these things.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: arrested, sanford wallace, spam, spamford
Companies: facebook, myspace
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Not excessive at all
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Not excessive at all
paraphrased from henry rollins, think tank.
if you've read this far then i am guilty too.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Not excessive at all
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Not excessive at all
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I hate spam...
It's to the point now where computer crimes are punished 7-8x as much as non-lethal violent crimes.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: I hate spam...
FTFY
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: I hate spam...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: I hate spam...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: I hate spam...
Judges don't like it when you ignore court orders. Whatever sentence he gets will be much more influenced by his total lack of respect for the courts than for how many computers he broke into. Society sure as hell will be better off with him not loose to do whatever he wants.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: I hate spam...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
One of the enduring truths about spammers...
Oh, and incidentally, Internet "old-timers" find Spamford and his ilk a relatively new problem.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
http://bash.org/?203815
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
40 years.
Remember, he missed court dates, even an FTC proceeding. He ignored court orders, and ignored multiple 9 figure judgements.
Courts don't like being ignored, with good reason I think.
40 years is pretty much what happens when you flout the law, ignore judgements, and don't flee the country.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Proportional
Spam?...That is the unforgiveable sin.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Proportional
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Clang
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
"Spamford" Wallace
If the POSSIBLE term is 40 years, so what?
If he was SENTENCED to 40 years, massive miscarriage of justice.
If he faces such a term, and then acts in a totally scornful way, continuing on, then maybe 40 years is reasonable.
Pegging on a POSSIBLE term as if it was the sentence makes no sense whatsoever.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: "Spamford" Wallace
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Sorry to disagree Mike
This is a person who has ignored or evaded the law for years. He just goes on. No court order will stop him. No conviction will stop him.
I think nothing short of keeping him safely locked up can stop him.
It's not that he's violent. He simply cannot stop inflicting billions of dollars of harm on society, which thinking he's doing nothing wrong.
He could be in minimum security. But he needs to be locked up at this point. Things have gone on for two long. He has clearly and willfully demonstrated that he simply will not stop.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]