'Timeshare Spammer' Set to Plead Guilty

[ColinSick]

'Timeshare Spammer' Set to Plead Guilty

By GREG BLUESTEIN, Associated Press Writer Thu Jun 30,12:54 PM ET

ATLANTA - A man known as "The Timeshare Spammer" said Thursday he will plead guilty to one count of violating anti-spam laws, marking one of the first prosecutions using the federal statute.

Peter Moshou, 37, of Auburndale, Fla., could face up to three years in prison for violating a federal anti-spam law. Prosecutors say Moshou sent millions of unsolicited commercial e-mails using Atlanta-based EarthLink's network.

The messages, sent throughout 2004 and 2005, were about brokerage services for people interested in selling their timeshares.

EarthLink filed a civil lawsuit against Moshou in January after the company detected a massive influx of spam in its system and later handed its investigation over to federal prosecutors.

On Thursday, as Moshou awaited a first hearing with U.S. Magistrate Gerrilyn Brill, he did not seem like a man who could face prison time and a fine of up to $350,000 for sending the spam e-mails. Wearing a striped shirt and tennis shoes, Moshou idly chatted with prosecutors about spam attempts, laughing as one joked about spamming ploys.

But when the court hearing began, no one on either side of the counsel table was laughing.

"Internet spam is more than just an annoyance," said U.S. Attorney David Nahmias. "It is criminal."

EarthLink says the e-mails falsify "from" addresses, use deceptive subject lines, fail to identify the sender and fail to provide an electronic unsubscribe option, among other violations.

Those requirements are part of the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act of 2003. Spammers who violate the rules face possible prison time and criminal fines of up to $250,000 for individuals and $500,000 for an organization.

Moshou's case is among the first prosecutions using the federal law, said Larry Slovensky, EarthLink's assistant general counsel.

The first criminal conviction under the federal law was believed to be in September 2004, when Nicholas Tombros, of Marina del Rey, Calif., pleaded guilty of using unprotected wireless networks to send more than 100 unsolicited adult-themed e-mails from his car.

Moshou's case marks the second high-profile prosecution EarthLink has helped secure. After the Internet service provider in 2003 won a $16.4 million judgment against Howard Carmack, the so-called Buffalo Spammer, the company turned its evidence over to New York prosecutors.

In May 2004, Carmack was sentenced to up to seven years in prison for sending 850 million junk e-mails through accounts he opened with stolen identities.

Moshou is expected to enter his guilty plea at 4 p.m. Thursday before U.S. District Judge Richard Story.

[ColinSick]

WOW!

A convicted spammer would probably have a tough time in prison. Spammers are some of the most reviled people on the planet. :lol:

[ColinSick]

Spammer arrested in airport on return to US

Steps off the plane and is collared by the Feds...
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By Will Sturgeon

Published: Wednesday 6 July 2005

One of the world's most prolific spammers has been arrested in the US as he stepped off a plane from the Dominican Republic, where he had been holed up running his illegal operation.

Christopher Smith, originally from Minnesota, has moved his operation around the world to locations such as China and Malaysia, according to Spamhaus. Earlier this year US authorities seized assets from Smith and shut down one of his businesses which was illegally selling pharmaceuticals online.

According to Steve Linford from Spamhaus, who traces the movements of the world's worst spammers, Smith then went on the run with a fake passport.

During this time Spamhaus was in contact with the FBI, sharing information on Smith's movements and activities. Spamhaus was notified by the FBI about Smith's plans to return to the US and Smith was arrested late last week as he stepped off the plane in Minneapolis.

According to Linford, Smith was a particularly prolific spammer.

"He was well up in our top 10," Linford told silicon.com. But it was his foolish decision to the return to the US which was his undoing.

"It seems that he must have forgotten something and came back but really I think he was just incredibly stupid," said Linford.

Ironically, at the height of his powers Smith was not spamming to promote his own online pharmacies, he was spamming to promote other businesses, according to Linford.

Last week's arrest was related to Smith skipping bail and travelling with forged documents, following his initial arrest for illegally selling pharmaceuticals. But Linford isn't too worried that the arrest did not take into account Smith's spamming, as long as he is now out of the picture.

"Behind bars is behind bars," Linford told silicon.com.

Unsurprisingly, given the close tabs the organisation kept on him, Smith also had a particular axe to grind with Spamhaus.

"At one point he even tried to register the domain Spamhaus.org.uk and offer spam services from it in an attempt to damage our reputation," Linford told silicon.com

[ColinSick]

New Spam-Fighting Technique Criticized

By ANICK JESDANUN, AP Internet Writer Fri Jul 22, 8:27 AM ET

NEW YORK - Escalating the war on spam, a California company wants to let thousands of users collaborate to disable the Web sites spammers use to sell their wares.


A leading anti-spam advocate, however, criticized Blue Security Inc.'s Blue Frog initiative as being no more than a denial-of-service attack, the technique hackers use to effectively shut down a Web site by overwhelming it with fake traffic.

"It's the worst kind of vigilante approach," said John Levine, a board member with the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail. "Deliberate attacks against people's Web sites are illegal."

Levine recalled a screen saver program that the Web portal Lycos Europe distributed briefly last year. The program was designed to overwhelm sites identified by Lycos as selling products pitched in spam.

Eran Reshef, Blue Security's founder and chief executive, denied any wrongdoing, saying Blue Frog was merely empowering users to collectively make complaints they otherwise would have sent individually.

Here's how the technique works:

_When users add e-mail addresses to a "do-not-spam" list, Blue Security creates additional addresses, known as honeypots, designed to do nothing but attract spam.

_If a honeypot receives spam, Blue Security tries to warn the spammer. Then it triggers the Blue Frog software on a user's computer to send a complaint automatically.

_Thousands complaining at once will knock out a Web site and thus encourage spammers to stop sending e-mail to the "do-not-spam" list.

Reshef acknowledges that the technique only works if enough users — say, 100,000 — join. The program is initially free, but Reshef said Blue Security might eventually charge new users.

[ColinSick]

Russia’s Biggest Spammer Brutally Murdered in Apartment

Created: 25.07.2005 13:14 MSK (GMT +3), Updated: 14:24 MSK, 15 hours 9 minutes ago

MosNews

Vardan Kushnir, notorious for sending spam to each and every citizen of Russia who appeared to have an e-mail, was found dead in his Moscow apartment on Sunday, Interfax reported Monday. He died after suffering repeated blows to the head.

Kushnir, 35, headed the English learning centers the Center for American English, the New York English Centre and the Centre for Spoken English, all known to have aggressive Internet advertising policies in which millions of e-mails were sent every day.

In the past angry Internet users have targeted the American English centre by publishing the Center’s telephone numbers anywhere on the Web to provoke telephone calls. The Center’s telephone was advertised as a contact number for cheap sex services, or bargain real estate sales.

Another attack involved hundreds of people making phone calls to the American English Center and sending it numerous e-mails back, but Vardan Kushnir remained sure of his right to spam, saying it was what e-mails were for.

Under Russian law, spamming is not considered illegal, although lawmakers are working on legal projects that could protect Russian Internet users like they do in Europe and the U.S.

[ColinSick]

Microsoft Receives $7M in Spam Settlement

8 minutes ago

REDMOND, Wash. - A man once accused of being one of the world's top three spammers has agreed to pay $7 million in a settlement with Microsoft Corp., the software maker announced Tuesday.


The money from Scott Richter and his company, OptInRealBig.com of Westminster, Colo., will be used to boost efforts to combat the illegal sending of unsolicited and misleading e-mail known as spam and other computer misuse, said Microsoft's chief counsel, Brad Smith, in a news release issued Tuesday morning.

"This settlement is a victory for consumers who rely on the Internet because it also means fewer unwanted e-mails in your inbox," Smith said.

"After covering our legal expenses for the case, Microsoft will then reinvest every penny from this settlement," he said. "We'll dedicate $5 million to increase our Internet enforcement efforts and expand technical and investigative support to help law enforcement address computer-related crimes."

Besides spending that money to enhance Internet safety partnerships with governments worldwide through training, technological development and investigative assistance, the company pledged $1 million to expand computer access for the poor at community centers in New York state.

The settlement is conditional upon dismissal of bankruptcy petitions Richter and his 4-year-old company have pending in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Denver, and they were expected to file the required motions Tuesday, according to the company's statement.

He and his affiliated businesses also agreed to comply with federal and state laws, including CAN-SPAM, the federal Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act, and will not send spam to anyone who has not confirmed a willingness to receive it.

Another provision calls for three years of oversight of Richter's operations.

The agreement is the second involving litigation brought by Microsoft in King County Superior Court in Seattle and by New York Attorney General Elliott Spitzer in New York Supreme Court in Manhattan seeking as much as $20 million in fines in December 2003.

"Spam traps" set by Microsoft the previous May and June netted 8,000 messages containing 40,000 fraudulent statements, Spitzer said at the time, describing Richter as one of the three biggest spammers in the world.

In a settlement announced July 19, Richter and OptInRealBig.com agreed to pay New York State $50,000 in penalties and investigative costs, to provide Spitzer's office with customer information and all advertisements it sends and to use proper identifying information when registering Internet domain names.

Richter, who was removed last month from the Register of Known Spam Operators maintained by the Spamhaus Project, an anti-spam and consumer advocacy group, did not admit wrongdoing in the Microsoft news release but said he had changed the way he does business.

"In response to Microsoft's and the New York attorney general's lawsuits, we made significant changes to OptInRealBig.com's e-mailing practices and have paid a heavy price," he said. "I am committed to sending e-mail only to those who have requested it and to complying fully with all federal and state anti-spam laws."

[Adrian]

Russia’s Biggest Spammer Brutally Murdered in Apartment

Created: 25.07.2005 13:14 MSK (GMT +3), Updated: 14:24 MSK, 15 hours 9 minutes ago

MosNews

Vardan Kushnir, notorious for sending spam to each and every citizen of Russia who appeared to have an e-mail, was found dead in his Moscow apartment on Sunday, Interfax reported Monday. He died after suffering repeated blows to the head.

Kushnir, 35, headed the English learning centers the Center for American English, the New York English Centre and the Centre for Spoken English, all known to have aggressive Internet advertising policies in which millions of e-mails were sent every day.

In the past angry Internet users have targeted the American English centre by publishing the Center’s telephone numbers anywhere on the Web to provoke telephone calls. The Center’s telephone was advertised as a contact number for cheap sex services, or bargain real estate sales.

Another attack involved hundreds of people making phone calls to the American English Center and sending it numerous e-mails back, but Vardan Kushnir remained sure of his right to spam, saying it was what e-mails were for.

Under Russian law, spamming is not considered illegal, although lawmakers are working on legal projects that could protect Russian Internet users like they do in Europe and the U.S.


All spammers should suffer the same fate. Muahahaha

[whistle-tip]

Now only if we could get Frank 'Ponch' Poncherello--off the tv peddling his timeshares in CA and CO would be a good thing!

[ColinSick]

Now only if we could get Frank 'Ponch' Poncherello--off the tv peddling his timeshares in CA and CO would be a good thing!


http://img97.imageshack.us/img97/5452/erikstream6rt.jpg

"You're gonna love it!"

[whistle-tip]

all the people that they interview look like Megan's Law candidates

[ColinSick]

AOL Worker Who Stole E-Mail List Sentenced

By LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 33 minutes ago

NEW YORK - A former America Online software engineer was sentenced Wednesday to a year and three months in prison for stealing 92 million screen names and e-mail addresses and selling them to spammers who sent out up to 7 billion unsolicited e-mails.


"I know I've done something very wrong," a soft-spoken and teary eyed Jason Smathers told U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein.

The judge credited the 25-year-old former Harpers Ferry, W. Va., resident for his contrition and efforts to help the government before he pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges. A plea deal had called for a sentence of at least a year and a half in prison.

In a letter from Smathers to the court that was read partially into the record by Assistant U.S. Attorney David Siegal, Smathers tried to explain the crimes that AOL has said cost the company at least $400,000 and possibly millions of dollars.

"Cyberspace is a new and strange place," Siegal said Smathers wrote. "I was good at navigating in that frontier and I became an outlaw."

As the judge indicated he would be lenient toward Smathers, Siegal told Hellerstein that the public needs to learn from the case that the "Internet is not lawless."

"The public at large has an interest in making sure people respect the same values that apply in everyday life, on the Internet," Siegal said.

The judge imposed the reduced sentence of one year and three months, saying he recognized that Smathers cooperated fully with the government but did not have the kind of information that would have helped to build other criminal cases.

He said leniency was appropriate for "someone who tries hard to bare his soul but doesn't have the information the government needs."

In December, Hellerstein rejected the first attempt by Smathers to plead guilty, saying he was not convinced he had actually committed a crime. The judge accepted the plea in February, saying prosecutors had sufficiently explained why he had.

Smathers has admitted that he accepted $28,000 from someone who wanted to pitch an offshore gambling site to AOL customers, knowing that the list of screen names might make its way to others who would send e-mail solicitations.

The judge has recommended that Smathers be forced to pay $84,000 in restitution, triple what he earned. The imposition of restitution was delayed to give AOL a chance to prove the damages were much greater. The judge suggested the figure of at least $400,000 in damages was subjective.

Prosecutors said Smathers had engaged in the interstate transportation of stolen property and had violated a new federal CAN-SPAM law, short for Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act, which is meant to diminish unsolicited e-mail messages about everything from Viagra to mortgages.

In December, the judge said he had dropped his own AOL membership because he received too much spam.

America Online Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Time Warner Inc., has since launched a major assault on spam, significantly reducing unsolicited e-mails.

Smathers was fired by AOL last June. Authorities said he used another employee's access code to steal the list of AOL customers in 2003 from its headquarters in Dulles, Va.

Smathers allegedly sold the list to Sean Dunaway, of Las Vegas, who used it to send unwanted gambling advertisements to subscribers of AOL, the world's largest Internet provider. Charges are pending against Dunaway.

The stolen list of 92 million AOL addresses included multiple addresses used by each of AOL's estimated 30 million customers. It is believed to be still circulating among spammers.

The judge refused a Probation Department recommendation that Smathers be banned from his profession, saying he trusted Smathers had learned his lesson.

[Adrian]

While I don't condone spamming. He couldn't have picked a better company.

DOWN WITH AOL!! :rant: DOWN WITH AOL!! :rant: DOWN WITH AOL!! :rant:

[ColinSick]

Friends don't let friends use AOL.

[ColinSick]

Diversification Helps Spammer Make Fortune

By STEVE KARNOWSKI, Associated Press Writer Sun Aug 21,12:50 AM ET

BURNSVILLE, Minn. - Christopher Smith's neighbors didn't know exactly what he did for a living. But they knew well that he liked to collect expensive cars and set off fireworks at all hours.


At an age when most of his peers could barely afford a new car, Smith was amassing a collection that would include BMWs, Hummers, a Ferrari, a Jaguar and a Lamborghini. And when other 20-somethings were trying to save for down payments on modest starter homes, Smith paid $1.1 million for a house in a more affluent suburb.

Smith got all that through his successes in massive unsolicited e-mail marketing, authorities say. The Spamhaus Project, an anti-spam group, considered him one of the world's worst offenders.

He was just 25 when the feds in May shut down his flagship company, Xpress Pharmacy Direct, and seized $1.8 million in luxury cars, two homes and $1.3 million in cash held by Smith and associates.

But even then, prosecutors say, he refused to give up.

They say he tried to relaunch his online pharmacy from an offshore haven — the Dominican Republic — intending to build his business back up to $4.1 million in sales by its second month, right where it was before.

Brian McWilliams, author of "Spam Kings," said young people like Smith aren't unusual in the fast-buck world of spammers.

"A lot of them are guys who haven't had success anywhere else in life but they find this easy money to be made in the spam trade," he said. "They don't want to give it up."

Authorities were waiting when Smith flew back to Minneapolis in late June.

Smith remains free on bail as he awaits another hearing Thursday on contempt-of-court charges for which prosecutors are seeking six months in jail. He also faces a grand jury investigation of his e-mail businesses, which could lead to more charges and potentially longer sentences.

The high school dropout, operating under the nickname Rizler, got his start in the late 1990s, selling police radar and laser jammers. Along the way he added cable TV descramblers and other products.

After Time Warner Cable got an injunction in 2002 putting Smith out of the descrambler business, he diversified and generated more than $18 million in sales from drugs online, including the often-abused narcotic painkiller Vicodin, without obtaining proper prescriptions, federal prosecutors say.

Smith's former neighbors in a hilly, heavily wooded part of Burnsville were glad to see him go after he moved to pricier, more secluded digs in Prior Lake over the winter.

Sue Parson said things began to get out of hand in May 2004. When her husband complained about loud fireworks, she said, Smith's response was: "Too bad. We can set them off if we want to." Not long after one complaint, someone set off fireworks at the foot of the Parsons' driveway early one morning, she said.

Neighbors didn't know exactly what Smith did for a living. Parson said he told one person he had a lawn service, another that he was "into computers" and yet another that he was "into pharmaceuticals."

"There were these Hummers outside, the limos outside," she said. "It was like, 'Where do these people get their money from?'"

Just four days after a federal judge put Xpress Pharmacy Direct into receivership, Smith made what prosecutors say was a brazen play to stay in business.

Smith took off for the Dominican Republic and went to work setting up a new online pharmacy and call center, where prosecutors say he hoped he'd be safe from extradition and out of the reach of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

Former employees, his wife and even his girlfriend brought or sent Smith "substantial sums of cash" there, and one former employee passed him a disk with data on more than 100,000 Xpress Pharmacy customers, court documents and testimony allege.

Smith even managed to withdraw some money from an account that was supposed to be frozen. He also launched two new Web sites, the documents allege.

In the Dominican Republic, Smith was a guest of Creaghan Harry, a man the government described as another notorious spammer.

According to the court documents, Harry, who runs a call center there, earned more than $2 million from Smith for telemarketing.

Harry said the call center he manages, Santo Domingo-based Americas Best Worldwide, was just one of many that took orders for Smith. He said it had no other connection with Smith's new business.

"We basically got pulled in to this because Chris Smith decided to come down here," Harry told The Associated Press. "But we are not his company or even his call center. Taking pharmaceutical orders is only a small part of our business."

Harry acknowledged that Smith had stayed in his Santo Domingo apartment for a week in early June, but then left for a beach resort in Boca Chica, outside Santo Domingo, where he took up scuba diving. He then went to the eastern island resort town of Punta Cana, Harry said.

"It just seemed Chris was on vacation," he said.

Though Smith mentioned over a few lunches in Santo Domingo that he planned to start up a new business, he didn't offer details, Harry said.

Whether it was a business trip or vacation, it ended with Smith going straight to jail when he returned to Minnesota.

Authorities arrested him on a contempt-of-court warrant and said in court last month that they plan to seek unspecified criminal charges against him. Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicole Engisch told U.S. District Judge Michael Davis a grand jury has been hearing evidence against Smith and others she did not name. She said she did not know when indictments might come down, nor did she say what the charges might be.

Smith and his stepfather declined to comment on his legal troubles as he left the courthouse the next day after his release on $50,000 bail. Prosecutors also declined to comment on the case, citing the ongoing investigation.

Smith's father,
Scott Smith, declined to comment for this story after initially agreeing to talk. In an earlier interview with the Star Tribune, he portrayed his son as a business genius who dropped out of high school because he was bored.

"That spamming stuff they talk about, sometimes Chris may have been a middleman helping other business people, but he never broke the law. I'm sure of it," Scott Smith told the newspaper.

As Smith sat in Davis' courtroom, wearing orange jail garb and flashing an occasional forlorn smile at his father and wife, high-profile local defense lawyer Joe Friedberg conceded that Smith had violated the judge's May 20 injunction by taking $2,000 from a frozen account.

But Friedberg contends the government hasn't proven that anything else Smith did in the Dominican Republic was illegal.

As Davis freed Smith on bail, he put him on home monitoring and ordered him to surrender his passports.

And Davis admonished Smith: Stay away from computers and don't set up any more Web sites.

___

[ColinSick]

N.Y. Spammer Sentenced in Closed Session

12 minutes ago

LOS ANGELES - A New York man was sentenced Monday for sending more than 9 million spam advertisements in online instant messages to members of a networking Web site in a hearing that was closed to the public. The sentence is under seal and the session was closed at the defense attorney's request.


Anthony Greco, 18, of Cheektowaga, N.Y., agreed earlier this year to plead guilty in a deal that would result in a sentence of 18 months to two years in prison, according to federal court documents. Greco admitted sending messages to the Los Angeles-based Web site MySpace.com, threatening to share his spamming techniques with others.

Hoyt Sze of the federal public defender's office declined to comment on the reason for the closed session and would not confirm if Greco had received the sentence outlined in the plea deal.

Federal prosecutors will ask the judge on Tuesday to make the sentence public, spokesman Thom Mrozek said.

MySpace.com provides a free forum for members interested in such things as chatting online, meeting others with similar interests, keeping in touch with family members and finding old friends.

According to the plea agreement, MySpace hired Greco to write a computer program that would send its users instant message ads for adult and mortgage refinancing Web sites. He then created 27,000 fake MySpace accounts through which he sent the spam last fall, according to the plea deal.

After sending the spam e-mails, Greco contacted MySpace and requested permanent employment to guard against more spam and to get exclusive rights to send commercial e-mail through the site. When his request was ignored, prosecutors said, Greco threatened to tell others how to spam MySpace users.

The company, whose parent agreed in July to be acquired by media giant News Corp., spent more than $20,000 deleting unopened messages from its computer servers, fortifying its system and addressing customer complaints, authorities said.

[whistle-tip]

do people make money doing this? the time spent doing it just doesnt seem to justify the means. :confused:

[ColinSick]

I think they make millions. There are lots of stupid people who respond to spam.