Las
Vegas Porn Operation Sued For Spam
In Las Vegas, a pornography operation that sent out hundreds of
thousands of sexually explicit "spam" eMail messages has been
temporarily shut down in the first case of federal spam laws being
used against sex marketers.
The
Federal Trade Commission said the operation, which runs up to
20 Web sites, did not properly label its eMail with a "SEXUALLY-EXPLICIT:"
tag and violated several other aspects of a year-old anti-spam
law.
Six
businesses and five men have had their assets temporarily frozen
by a Las Vegas federal court and are prohibited from sending out
any deceptive spam as the case proceeds, the FTC said. Only one
of the men charged actually sent out the e-mail but the others
are held liable because they hired him.
Unwanted
pornography and other forms of spam account for up to 85 percent
of all e-mail, up from roughly 55 percent when the CAN-SPAM Act
took effect one year ago. The defendants included explicit content
in their messages, did not label them properly, did not label
them as advertisements and did not provide a way for consumers
to stop getting them, all violations of the CAN-SPAM Act.
Some
of the messages falsely claimed that access to the Web sites was
free, a violation of deceptive-business laws. Those charged could
be required to give up the money they made from the operation
and prevented from sending out any more deceptive eMail. The FTC
does not have the authority to put people in jail or levy fines
for a first offense.
The
Holistic Wisdom Corporation