The lowly seer

US court tries to destroy Spamhaus

Getting too much spam in your inbox? You'd have loads more if not for the noble efforts of Spamhaus, a volunteer who tracks down and exposes spammers, and provides ISPs and the like with lists of the worst to block.
However an alleged spammer, e360insight, brought a court action against Spamhaus on the basis of loss of trade. Spamhaus has refused to defend itself in the court claiming that being a British organisation, a US court has no jurisdiction, moreover admitting its jurisdiction would result in every spammer, his brother and his brother's dog bringing similar suits.
If there are two institutions that seem incapable of understanding anything to do with the net, they are print-based journalists and courts. The judge has slapped a $11.7m fine on Spamhaus, which can only be a deliberate attempt to destroy the body, and more recently, tried to get ICANN to de-register their domain.
e360insight claims to be a legitimate opt-in marketer (but so do most spammers), while Spamhaus contends it has actual examples of their spam in its honeytraps. While I can't say for definite who's in the right, I think you can guess which of them I'd trust.

posted by Les the Spaceman @ 11:33 am