Spammers arrested, big deal.

So the big news is that a bunch of spammers have been rounded up for prosecution. This is a result of the CAN-SPAM Act. While this sounds terrific it is virtually meaningless. Why? Because spam, viruses, copyright crime, hacking, identity theft, and all the other digital difficulties that we believe must be fixed via US law are going overseas (just like other high tech jobs).

As punishments are meted out in the US for such things as spamming, foreign computer geeks look on with joy and wait their turn to make all that money. We could have the death penalty for spamming and it will still never stop it because the spam will just come from elsewhere. There will always be countries out there that are willing to protect digital baddies and act as data havens if there is money to be made, and there is. Lots of it.

NYT article here.

More on CAN-SPAM.

More former posts re spam -
first CAN-SPAM suit filed;
educate yourself about spam and viruses;
if you get spam blame yourself and go get educated on how to avoid it.