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30 Months in Prison for Spamming Over One Million AOL Users

By Ethisphere.com

The sentence came in yesterday for a New York man who plead guilty to sending spam email messages to over 1.2 million AOL users in a way that avoided being noticed by the company’s spam filter. The messages were used by Adam Vitale, 27, to try and sell a computer security program in return for 50 percent of the product’s profits, according to a report by Reuters News Agency and printed in PC Mag.

Now Mr. Vitale faces 30 months in prison and $180,000 restitution to be paid to AOL. As noted by U.S. District Judge Denny Chin, “Spamming is serious criminal conduct; this is not a teenager engaging in child’s play.”

While that is true, Mr. Vitale also had 22 prior convictions, including running an online prostitution ring through the website Craig’s List, which couldn’t have helped his odds in this case.

His partner in crime, Todd Moeller, was sentenced to 27 months back in November.

Full post as published by Ethisphere Blog - Good. Smart. Business. Profit. on July 16, 2008 (boomark / email).