Facebook has locked in a $873 million judgment against a spammer. It’s the largest award ever under the 2003 Can-Spam Act.
The Facebook award tops the $234 million judgment won by MySpace in May against Sanford Wallace and Walter Rines. Illegal spammers have been getting caught and penalized since 2007 when Jeffrey Kilbride and James Schaffer were ordered to pay $177,500 fine for a porn spam enterprise.
“We've all experienced spam -- those unwanted and, sometimes, inappropriate marketing messages," said Facebook director of security Max Kelly and deputy general counsel Mark Howitson. "The bad guys behind those messages are always looking to find new ways to annoy people and Facebook's users have been among those targeted. We don't take this affront to our users lying down."
U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel rendered the judgment last week after four months of testimony. The defendant, Adam Guerbuez and his company Atlantis Blue Capital are prohibited from accessing Facebook for any reason, nor can they assist others in setting up Facebook accounts.
It’s unlikely Facebook will ever collect the full judgment form Guerbuez and Atlantis Blue Capital, but the plaintiff really wanted to send a message to anyone else who attempts to abuse Facebook by spamming its users.
According to the complaint filed, Guerbuez sent more than 4 million spam messages to Facebook users in March and April. He accomplished this be stealing Facebook users’ logon and account information by creating phishing messages obtained through third parties. In addition, he used botnets to spam Facebook users by posting messages on their walls and pages while also hijacking the spam recipients friends on Facebook.
Posting to a Facebook users Wall-post is visible to anyone viewing the affected profile and gives the impression that the spam messages are approved by the account owner and the friend who posted them. People then believe spam messages on Facebook are more credible when they appear to come from a friend.
"The spam promoted numerous products and Web sites that, on information and belief, are offensive and embarrassing to [spam recipients and the owners of hijacked accounts that sent the spam]," the complaint explains. "The products marketed by these spam messages included marijuana, male enhancement pills, and sexually oriented material."
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