Sizable spammer Soloway's sentencing story

It's IT Blogwatch: in which a major convicted spammer, Robert Soloway, is facing sentence in federal court. Not to mention more fun times ahoy!...

Jaikumar Vijayan reports:

Notorious spam king Robert Alan Soloway is scheduled to be sentenced Monday by the U.S. District Court in Seattle after pleading guilty to single counts of mail fraud, e-mail fraud and tax evasion ... The first two charges carry maximum sentences of 20 years and five years, respectively, while the tax evasion charge carries a maximum penalty of one year. Soloway also faces fines of up to $250,000 on the first two counts and an additional $25,000 for tax evasion. Soloway was originally indicted last year on a 40-count charge that included mail and wire fraud, money laundering and aggravated identity theft. The indictment alleged that between October 1997 and May 2007, Soloway ran a company called Newport Internet Marketing, selling e-mail spamming services and a software product that let others send their own spam. more

Matt Markovich adds:

He's considered one of the most prolific spammers the Internet has ever known, and his fate is now in the hands of a federal judge. The judge's ruling will determine how much prison time Robert Soloway will serve, but more importantly, could set a precedent for spam victims in the future ... During the two-day hearing, which is expected to end Monday, Judge Marsha Pechman is hearing testimony from Soloway's victims. It's unusual to hear evidentiary testimony during a sentencing hearing, but this case is strewn with unusual issues ... Court records show Soloway earned nearly a half million dollars in 2004 and 2005. It's income he did not pay tax on. Should the judge decide the victims of Soloway's spamming are due money for their time and effort to fight the spam, it would set a new precedent for victims' claims in future spam cases. more

Bruno Silva blogs from Portugal:

The indictment alleged that between October 1997 and May 2007, Soloway ran Newport Internet Marketing (NIM) Company, selling e-mail spamming services and a software product that let others send spam of their own. Soloway claimed that his company had created a database containing over 157 million permission-based, opt-in e-mail addresses which customers could use to target spam by geography or audience interest. Now, after 10 years, comes the penalty! more

Gary Cutlack:

28-year-old Robert Soloway, who has previously been found guilty of sending out spam emails, has been clobbered again by the US courts. Your inbox might be about to get a bit more bearable. This time, he's really in trouble ... While Soloway has apparently weaselled his way out of paying $7.8 million to Microsoft over spam charges he faced in 2005, escaping the proper LAW might prove a bit tougher... Apparently earning $300k a year from his spamming system, Soloway has angered authorities - and hard-working, massively spammed individuals like ourselves - by bragging on the internet about being "sued for hundreds of millions of dollars" but never paying a penny ... Rob's spam empire might be a bit hard to maintain when his only means of communication with the outside world is via one letter to his mum every week. more

To which whiteathame reacts:

There is a difference between receiving a court-ordered judgment and collecting it. A court order appointing a trustee to oversee the seizure, sale and distribution of his assets and accounts would do the trick. ......and Microsoft hasn't figured this out???? more

And Bananas In The Falklands adds her twopenn'orth:

The word to remember while the Judge does her business is that Mr Soloway is guilty, and cannot appeal that. What is up in the air is the sentence, plea bargain or not the Judge (as i understand) is still independent. Whenever the court finishes (monday or tuesday 15 July) we should be in a better place to understand the ramifications. There’s as usual rather a lot of ... effluent coming from the the defence side most of which is easily debunked. The evidence stands that Soloway is a spammer, and it has taken a criminal court to haul him in after ignoring overtures from many. Whatever your view i have mine so go read up. more

Prof. Douglas A. Berman asks, and he did receive:

What a great chance, dear readers, to provide (creative?) advice to a federal judge as she considers how to craft a sentence under 3553(a)'s diverse mandates. Please suggest via the comments what kind of sentencing term you think fitting in this case.
TW: Well he broke the law 90 million times so give him one day jail time and $100 fine for EACH incident.
FasterThanKudzu: He should have to hand write "I am so sorry for all the spam." 90 million times.
rosignol: Drawing and quartering. Why, yes, I used to run a mailserver, why do you ask?
cdeboe: There's something particularly appealing about the death of a thousand cuts--or better, 90 million paper cuts.
Mike G: The anthill still seems appropriate to me. Any individual ant bite isn't all that cruel, is it? Just as any single spam message isn't all that much of an annoyance.
chris: His hard labor is to configure and maintain the spam filter for Congress. Every piece of spam that gets through adds 1 day to his sentence. Every piece of legitimate email that gets caught by a filter costs him a day ... As much as you hate spam, your mail administrator hates it even more. more

And finally...

• Bowja the Ninja, part II
  

Buffer overflow:

• Keith Combs: Sticking it to The Man
• John Wu: What is Segment Architecture
• LewisC: ACID vs BASE
• Sramana Mitra: Seven Tech Stocks For Long-Term Hold
• Boycott Novell: Taking Microsoft OOXML to Task

Other Computerworld bloggers:

• Seth Weintraub: Apple's poor planning becomes expensive
• Thomas Hoffman: Hey Uncle Sam: Incent Green IT for compliance efforts
• Mitch Betts: Where Web sites fail
• Ken Gagne: iPhone 3G: Will It Blend?
• Joyce Carpenter: Others get iPhone 3G. I get iBrick 2
• Mark Hall: VMware: Not dead yet
• Shark Tank: Back to Plan A
• Shark Bait: On my life, I swear...

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Richi Jennings is an independent analyst/adviser/consultant, specializing in blogging, email, and spam. A 21 year, cross-functional IT veteran, he is also an analyst at Ferris Research. You can follow him on Twitter, pretend to be Richi's friend on Facebook, or just use boring old email: blogwatch@richi.co.uk.

Previously in IT Blogwatch:

• Apple App Store surprises and delights
• Microsoft helps users downgrade to WinXP???
• Drop everything and patch your DNS: like, NOW