Facebook welcomes ruling against spammers

SOCIAL NOTWORKING site Facebook has welcomed a US court ruling against spammers who were ordered to pay $873 million in damages for sending unwanted messages to users of the popular social network.

Max Kelly, Facebook's director of security, told AP that the ruling by Judge Jeremy Fogel of the US District Court in San Jose, California, was an " important victory" for its users.

Spammer Adam Guerbuez and Atlantis Blue Capital were told to pay $436.2 million in statutory damages and another $436.2 million in aggravated statutory damages for violations of the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act (CAN-SPAM).

Kelly admits that it has a snowman's chance in hell of getting the money owed to it as it was unlikely that Geurbez and Atlantis Blue Capital could ever pay up.

However he said that it would still be a deterrent to "anyone and everyone who would seek to abuse Facebook and its users". Well anyone who abuses it by sending spam anyway. Normal abuse against Facebook users would be impossible to stop. µ

L'Inq
AP