Tech Journalist Recommends Suing Google Over Spam Blogs?

from the uh,-tom,-what? dept

I like reporter Tom Foremski and have linked to his stories in the past. I've never met the man, but we've emailed a few times in the past. But everyone has those days when they write something they clearly haven't thought much about, and it looks like Tom had one of those days recently. Dark Helmet alerts us to a short blog post that Foremski did for ZDNet that is all kinds of awful. The main focus is on suggesting that you turn in colleagues using unauthorized software to the SIIA to try to claim a $1 million prize. This is a really sleazy process used by the SIIA and the BSA for years. Perhaps you can forgive Tom for not knowing much about how these organizations work, but plenty of other reporters have detailed how these organizations bully companies who can't figure out how to produce the exact evidence that these organizations demand as "proof." These organizations are just nasty, often harming small businesses just because they can't find their specific licensing agreement on a legitimately purchased software application. Encouraging this kind of behavior is not a good idea, Tom.

And, of course, that claim that there's a "$1 million prize" is great for headlines, like the one Tom wrote, but the details always tell a different story. The real "prizes" are "up to $1 million." A few years back, we asked for proof that the BSA actually paid out a million dollar prize, and offered a similarly termed "up to $1 million" reward for anyone who could prove that the BSA paid someone $1 million. Of course, they couldn't, because these groups don't actually pay that much. In fact, in the year after we asked for proof of the $1 million prize, the BSA actually paid out a grand total of $136,000 to 42 different people -- an average of about $3,200. Putting the $1 million prize in the headline is playing into their bogus claims. It's the sort of thing that reporters shouldn't be doing. Let them put out their bogus press releases, but reporters should be debunking them.

Finally, in trying to explain why this is a good idea, Tom makes an odd and totally misapplied analogy:

I know that ZDNet for example, faces problems with its content being scraped and illegally being used on web sites that try to make money by running Google ads next to it. It's often difficult to stop that practice because it's tough to track down the owners.

But if SIIA went after Google, because it profits from illegal use of copyrighted content, then that would go a long way to stamping out that practice.

First off, we face the same "problem" here at Techdirt, with lots of sites scraping our content and putting it on other sites plastered with Google ads. Except, that we know it's not actually a "problem." Most of those sites get very little, if any, traffic, and search engines are smart enough these days to put the originator higher up in the results. The ad views on these sites aren't costing the original site any revenue. And, if they actually are getting any traffic, it doesn't take long for people to realize the original source and start going there instead. This isn't a "problem."

Second, what the hell does scraping sites have to do with turning your colleagues in for using unlicensed software? The two are totally different situations and have nothing to do with each other.

Finally, if SIIA went after Google because it profits from illegal use of copyrighted content, the lawsuit would be thrown out of court as soon as Google's lawyers said "DMCA safe harbors." This is pretty basic stuff, and someone who's been a tech reporter for as long as Foremski should know better than to think that it's either legal or sensible to suggest that an organization sue a third party that profits off of the potentially infringing activity of someone else. As Dark Helmet noted with his submission:

This is 3rd party culpability, which is odd coming from a blogger and journalist. Has he ever ran a story about something illegal that was done? And did that publication have advertisements on it? So didn't he profit from the illegal activity? Shouldn't he have the FBI going after him for such illicit behavior?"

Again, Tom usually does pretty good work, so I'm going to chalk this up to a rushed post without putting much thought into what he was saying.

Filed Under: blogs, copying, copyright, software, spam
Companies: google, siia

It's Probably Not A Good Idea To Ask People To Spam The Judge Hearing Your Case With Support Emails

from the pro-tips dept

Generally speaking, if you're on trial for something, it's probably not a good idea to piss off the judge. Informercial king Kevin Trudeau has been battling the FTC concerning his pitches for a diet book, which the FTC felt were deceiving. The court case itself has had a series of twists and turns, but as the latest case moved forward, Trudeau posted the judge's email address to his website, and announced it on his radio show, and asked people to email the judge in his support. Apparently, quite a few people did so -- and the judge was not amused, sentencing him to 30 days in jail. As Consumerist notes, the types of people who buy the sorts of things Trudeau is selling might not be the most rationally-minded people, and apparently a few took it upon themselves to not just email the judge their support of Trudeau, but to send vaguely threatening messages as well.

Still, there is an open question as to whether or not this is actually illegal. Eric Robinson points out that it's common enough for those on trial to have friends contact a judge, sometimes even via email. Of course, those sorts of setups are usually more limited to a specific group of selected friends, rather than broadcast to the public at large. Either way -- whether legal or not -- it does seem like a generally smart tip to remember: don't piss off a judge in charge of dealing with your case, and urging a hoard of followers to email that judge is pretty certain to piss him off.

Filed Under: contempt of court, kevin trudeau, spam

An Olympian Spammer Discovers That Reputation Is A Scarce Good You Don't Want To Destroy

from the it's-your-reputation dept

Given what the Olympics have become lately, I have to admit to not paying attention to any of it so far. I heard the news of the luger's death, and that's been about it. So perhaps more people already knew about this, but apparently one of the mogul skiers has a bit of a reputation as a spam/spyware purveyor. It sounds like the guy is now out of that business, but what's fascinating is how his reputation has been tarnished over all of this, despite winning Olympic medals. The Canadians wouldn't let him on the team this time around years back, due to their dislike of his activities, so he switched his citizenship to Australia, and basically, it sounds like everyone hates him:

After Begg-Smith's second place finish in Vancouver this week, one Australian news organization published an article calling him--in the headline, no less--a "sourpuss." Another, the Sydney Morning Herald, labeled the Olympic athlete as "Mr. Miserable" and speculated that he was "simply flying a flag of convenience" with no real ties to Oz.

Canadians were more direct. Facebook groups such as "Dale Begg-Smith is a sourpuss" and another calling him a "traitor" have popped up. Twitter messages after the mogul race have included "traitor," "fake Canadian and all-around jerk," plus other phrases entirely unsuitable for a family publication.

Obviously, some of that hatred is due to him switching citizenship, but the article explains why his spamming/spyware activities are a large part of it as well (and may have resulted in the citizenship switch). I find this interesting not just because of the Olympic angle, but because of the reputation angle.

Reputation is a rather valuable "scarce good," and destroying your reputation through shady activities can come back to bite you for a long, long time, even if you do plenty of other amazing things. Just ask Metallica.

Filed Under: adware, begg-smith, malware, olympics, spam, spyware

FCC Boss Spams Facebook Friends With Make Money Now Scam

from the whoops dept

Hey, sooner or later everyone falls for some sort of phishing/scamware type of thing, right? It's just especially embarrassing if you're the head of the FCC. The NY Times is reporting that FCC Chair Julius Genachowski had his Facebook account spam all his friends with a message saying "Adam got me started making money with this" which was followed by a link to a now defunct site. Facebook has taken down Genachowski's page, and appears to be effectively blaming him for the problem, putting out a generic notice about how users need to be careful not to click on strange links...

Filed Under: julius genachowski, phishing, spam
Companies: facebook

No, Sending Spam Text Messages Is Not The Same As Hacking Someone's Phone

from the misusing-computer-fraud-law dept

There's just something about the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act -- the "anti-hacking" law in the US -- that seems to leave it open for abuse in lawsuits. This is the law that was used to convict Lori Drew. Even though the judge eventually tossed the ruling, it showed how the broadly-worded law could be applied in dangerous ways. Still, at least some attempts at twisting the law aren't getting very far. For example, a woman in Minnesota tried to use the law against a company that sent her spam text messages she never requested, and discovered that in order to bring a case under a law, you have to actually show that the law was broken:

Plaintiff brings three possible claims: (1) a claim for obtaining information from her phone; (2) a claim for transmitting information or code through her phone; and (3) a claim for "accessing" her phone.

Information Claim: The court rejects the information-based claim because there's no information that WSOD allegedly obtained through accessing the plaintiff's phone. Plaintiff analogizes to websites and argues that any time someone sends a message to a mobile phone, information is "obtained" in the same way that information is obtained any time someone accesses a website. The court rejects this analogy, finding that "there is a fundamental difference between viewing websites and communicating with wireless devices such as cell phones by sending text messages." Even if the transmission of an unwanted text message somehow resulted in the "obtaining of information," the court concludes that there's no loss as a result of defendant having obtained the information.

Transmission Claim: The transmission claim requires plaintiff to allege that WSOD caused the transmission of code or information and as a result "intentionally caused damage without authorization" to plaintiff's device. The complaint fails on both counts. There wasn't a credible allegation of damage (there was no allegation of impairment to the machine) or of WSOD's intent to cause the damage.

Access Claim: The court rejects the access claim since plaintiff does not adequately allege that the unauthorized access was intentional.

So, nice try, but no dice. Someone sending unsolicited text messages to your mobile phone may be annoying (and potentially illegal under other laws), but it's not hacking under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

Filed Under: computer fraud and abuse act, hacking, spam

Spamming Patent Tossed Out As Obvious

from the is-that-good-or-bad? dept

Slashdot points us to the news that a patent (6,631,400 -- which appears to be incorrectly titled "Statement regarding federally sponsored research or development.") on managing spamming efforts has been tossed out as obvious by the federal circuit, following a similar ruling at the lower level.

What's most interesting here is that while some of the steps were thrown out due to prior art, the final step was tossed out due to "common sense." This is important. For quite some time, the courts seemed to insist that obviousness could only be proven through prior art. But something can be both obvious and new. In fact, the patent law has been clear that patents are supposed to be for things that are both new and non-obvious to those skilled in the art, but the question of obviousness was rarely discussed, as everyone just focused on the "newness." That's finally been changing, in large part due to the Supreme Court's KSR ruling that reminded people that obviousness is important, and that it's separate from newness. Since then, both examiners and the courts seem willing to put a bit more common sense into determining obviousness, and that's absolutely a good thing.

Of course, some of you might feel that having a patent on a spamming technique is a good thing, since it could be used to prevent others from spamming, but that didn't seem to be happening anyway, so let's just be happy that a bad patent has been rejected.

Filed Under: ksr, obviousness, patents, spam

Spam King Alan Ralsky Gets Four Years In Jail

from the how's-that-house-looking-now? dept

Remember Alan Ralsky? The "spam king" came to be well known online in 2002 after agreeing to a profile in the Detroit Free Press, where he bragged about all the spamming he did and the huge house it had bought him. The folks on Slashdot decided to do something about Ralsky, and started signing him up for all sorts of snail mail marketing offers, so his real life mailbox was overflowing with ads. The humor-impaired Ralsky apparently couldn't see the irony, saying he was going to sue the people involved. He never seemed to actually get around to that. Instead, while it took quite some time, law enforcement started investigating Ralsky. While he had loudly insisted that the CAN SPAM law wouldn't impact him, the FBI disagreed. Last year, he was finally indicted. Earlier this year he entered a guilty plea and has now been sentenced to four years in jail for his spamming and fraud activities -- reported in the same Detroit Free Press that ran that original profile of him. Maybe he should have avoided bragging about the mansion that spam built.

Filed Under: alan ralsky, fraud, sentence, spam

Sanford Wallace Loses Again; Owes Facebook $711 Million

from the good-luck-collecting dept

Sanford "Spamford" Wallace, of course, was the original "spam king" back in the 1990s. Despite his claim to have reformed at one point, he apparently has been spamming various social networks and advertising spyware. Back in 2004, the FTC investigated him and fined him $4 million. Last year, MySpace won a $234 million judgment against him. Wallace responded by disappearing. At one point, even his lawyer couldn't find him. Earlier this year, when Facebook sued him for spamming their users as well, it seemed unlikely that he would bother to respond. Surprising pretty much everyone, he showed up in court, though claimed he was totally bankrupt. Either way, Facebook has just been awarded a $711 million judgment against him. Facebook, of course, will never see a dime of that money. But, the real question is what else can be done to stop Wallace. He's been spamming for well over a decade at this point, and despite multiple multi-million dollar judgments against him, he hasn't stopped. What else can be done?

Filed Under: sanford wallace, spam, spamford
Companies: facebook

Zombie Spam Blacklists Return From The Dead To Make A Point

from the if-your-mail-isn't-getting-through... dept

I have to admit that I don't follow the "spam" world as closely as I used to, but I remember back around 2003, one of the hot topics was whether or not the various spam blacklists went too far at times. The anti-spam fighters behind those lists would often take a rather... inclusive attitude to putting IP addresses and address ranges into their lists, and plenty of giant ISPs relied on the judgment of those spam fighters by simply plugging in their lists. This often resulted in significant collateral damage, as perfectly legitimate emails would get blocked as coming from a "spam IP." Of course, those lists needed to change frequently, but at times, they would just suddenly disappear. That last link was about a popular anti-spam blacklist from Osirusoft that was shut down -- with its owners changing the settings to include all addresses. The idea was to make it clear to ISPs who didn't pay attention, to stop using the list, but in the meantime, think of all the damage?

It looks like that same sort of thing may be happening six years later. Michael Scott points us to the news of another long-abandoned blackhole list, called blackholes.us, that was abandoned a couple years ago -- but which some ISPs still rely on. However, whoever now controls the nameservers where blackholes.us used to be, apparently decided to set up a new "list" that (again) includes the entire range of IP addresses -- so every query is returned as being a spammer IP.

Again, the idea is to force ISPs to stop using that blacklist -- and perhaps you can make the argument that (unlike the Osirusoft situation) these ISPs have had two years to stop relying on the "zombie" blacklist, but it still seems unwise to create so much collateral damage, just to force the issue.

Filed Under: blackholes.us, blacklist, spam

Why Would The Copyright Lobby Be Concerned About An Anti-Spam Bill?

from the because-it-may-hurt-their-rootkits dept

Up in Canada, there have been ongoing discussions and negotiations over an anti-spam law. While I have various reservations over anti-spam legislation (here in the US it's done little to stop spam, but plenty to outline how to "legitimately" spam people), it's a bit surprising to find out that the copyright lobby is heavily involved in the process as well. Why would the copyright lobby care about an anti-spam bill? Apparently, they're afraid that it'll hinder their use of DRM, since the current bill requires consent before installing software on computers. And, as we learned in Sony's famous rootkit debacle, plenty of DRM works by surreptitiously installing software that watches what you do with content. Of course, the last thing the entertainment industry would want is to be required to be 100% upfront and truthful with you when it's installing spyware/DRM on your computer. That would -- in their minds -- defeat the point.

So, the copyright lobby has been making sure to water down the bill, to try to cut out the language that would cover their use of surreptitious spyware/DRM:

Sources say that the Liberals have introduced a motion that would take these practices outside of the bill. In its place, they would define computer program as, among other things, "a program that has as its primary function...inducing a user to install software by intentionally misrepresenting that installing that software is necessary to safeguard security or privacy or to open or play content of a computer program." This sets such a high bar - primary function, intentional mispresentation - that music and software industry can plausibly argue that surreptitious DRM installations fall outside of C-27.

And, of course, once the copyright lobby can put spyware on your machine, they want to be sure they can spy on you and use that information against you:

PIPEDA currently features a series of exceptions to the standard requirements for obtaining consent for the collection of personal information (found in Section 7). Bill C-27 includes a provision that bars those exceptions in cases involving computer harvesting of email addresses and the "collection of personal information through any means of telecommunication, if the collection is made by accessing a computer system or causing a computer system to be accessed without authorization." In other words, email harvesting and spyware would not be permitted and would not qualify for the PIPEDA exceptions found in Section 7.

The copyright lobby is deeply concerned that this change will block attempts to track possible infringement through electronic means. The Section 7(1)(b) exception in PIPEDA currently states that collecting personal information without consent or knowledge of the individual is permitted if it is reasonable to expect that the collection "would compromise the availability or accuracy of the information" and the collection is "related to investigating a breach of an agreement or a contravention of the laws of Canada."

It's really stunning what kind of sense of entitlement the entertainment industry has -- insisting that it should have the right to install spyware on your computer without you knowing about it, and to then collect all sorts of private info about you and what you do on your computer. Shameful.

Filed Under: canada, copyright, spam