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WA Legislature Makes It Easier To Sue Spammers 16

jhylkema writes "According to the Seattle P-I, the Washington state legislature has unanimously passed a bill that makes it easier for spammers to be sued for $500 per message by allowing them to be sued in district ("the people's") court. This should put an end to the many problems that potential spam litigants have faced here. You can email Governor Locke here and ask him to sign it into law."
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WA Legislature Makes It Easier To Sue Spammers

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  • You have to find the spammer first.

    Does anyone have any insight into how you would go about finding enough information about the spammer to build a case? It seems like this would be the toughest part of the whole deal.
    • How does this work for spam that comes from foreign ISP's like China? This will fail because of the non-border reach of the internet. I wish it would work, but I am afraid it will just clog the courts.
      • If the spammer is operating out of someplace that has strong anti-spam laws, then you may be able to work something out, especially if you can enlist the aid of a local lawyer or the local law enforcement folks. I don't think that has been done so far, but I'd love to be proved wrong.

        Otheriwse, your're probably SOL.

        One thing to remember is that just beacuse the spam is sent from an open relay in Glubknowswhere, the person/company behind that spam may very well live in the US. If you can subpoena your way
    • I haven't sued any spammers...yet.

      If the spammer is stupid, they will put personal information (company phone/address, etc) in the email or in the domain registrations. You can also link things together by looking at informtion contained in places like SpamHaus [spamhaus.org] and the various block lists. You can also call/email posing as a potential customer to get data. Company information can often be researched through state/county/city clerks offices (sometimes over the net).

      I'm not sure how the process works exactl
  • by SuperguyA1 ( 90398 ) on Wednesday April 09, 2003 @03:57PM (#5696118) Homepage
    I can just imagine the flood of anti-spam email in Governor Locke's Inbox.

    Sometimes irony is so ironic.

  • by DeComposer ( 551766 ) on Wednesday April 09, 2003 @04:01PM (#5696163) Journal
    1.) If you do not live in the state of Washington, don't bother to email Gov. locke; he doesn't care about your opinion.

    2.) If you do live in the state of Washington, there's probably not much point emailing Gov. Locke, anyway; the bill has passed unanimously in both the house and the senate. No governor is going to intentionally alienate 100% of his constituency.

    OTOH, I'd feel better if his office had not declined to comment about his position...
  • What's needed (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Sandman1971 ( 516283 ) on Wednesday April 09, 2003 @10:24PM (#5698702) Homepage Journal
    What's needed is not only the capability of suing the spammer, but also suing the business which hired the spammer in the first place (which is much easier to find than the spammer him/herself). This way, it would discourage companies from hiring spammers, since they themselves would be liable.
  • If cats are so flammable why do they like to sit so close to the fireplace?! I mean WTF cant they just like snuggle with my spike strip and eat anthrax be good kitty and go lie down

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