MySpace wins £120 million anti-spam payout

14 May 2008

MySpace has been awarded $230 million (£120 million) in damages against two spammers.

The record award, made by a Los Angeles court, is almost half the amount that News Corporation paid to buy the social network in 2005.

Speaking to the Associated Press (AP), MySpace's chief security officer Hemanshu Nigam explained that Spammers Sanford Wallace and Walter Rines had created multiple MySpace accounts, and had used phishing scams to take over those of other people. They had then contacted the network's users purporting to be their friends, and urged them to follow links to various money-making sites – which included pornographic and gambling websites.

MySpace said that the pair had sent more than 730,000 messages in total.

The court handed down the judgement in default, after the two spammers failed to turn up to the hearing. Although few commentators expect that MySpace will succeed in collecting the damages, some hope that the huge award will help to discourage future spam attacks.

"In the war against spam it is right that large companies suffering should have a heavy stick like this to hit the spammers with," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for web security firm Sophos.

However, he added: "The simple fact is that spam works. Until people pledge not to click on links in unsolicited emails and never to buy goods sold via spam, there will still be lowlifes like Wallace and Rines trying to fill our inboxes."

Category: Social media