At 12:21 AM -0400 8/10/00, Barry Shein wrote:

Where did this dopey "spammers will just move offshore" idea come from?

Me.

The legal term is "agency", hire someone to do something illegal to promote your US business and you're in trouble.

But what if you don't KNOW that they're doing something illegal? e.g., you hire Joe's Marketing Company, and without your knowledge Joe's Mktg Co spams people. I'm no lawyer, but it seems silly that you'd be liable for stuff you weren't even aware of (or perhaps that you had told them not to do but they did anyway, who knows).

Besides there are a million cooperating treaties between major nations and, etc...

For major criminal activities like kiddie porn and drug smuggling? Sure. For spam complaints? You'd probably get laughed at all the way from one side of the globe to the other (Sadly).

Do people really believe you can open a mail order crack house in the UK and sell to US customers...???

No.

Besides, that's making the best the enemy of the good, it's not like spamming is some multibillion dollar biz that's going to open glass and steel skyscraper complexes in Afgahnistan.

It's the same pimply sociopaths who smurf, junk fax (do you find yourself getting lots of offshore junk faxes???), etc.

Make it illegal in the US, assume they'll make it illegal in other countries which don't want to see their internet access disrupted because they're rogue countries and blocked or severely whitelisted.

Maybe you haven't been keeping track, but us Merkins aren't really well-liked or respected outside the borders of the land we live in. Other countries won't "cave in" that easily, methinks.

It's a heckuva lot more promising than whining that spammers might launch their own space stations to spam from.

Who said anything about space programs? ;-)

Cripes, as it stands you can't even stop that schmuck in Georgia who has been mass spamming copier toner supplies for years. You can't touch him (obviously, he keeps doing it and putting his name and 800 number in the spam.)

He ain't going to Libya to operate his toner business any time soon...trust me on this. But why bother he's perfectly safe in Georgia.

My point exactly... when his lucrative source of income is gone, you don't think he'll move the operation somewhere that he can continue to make money? (I must assume its lucrative or he wouldn't still be wasting time on it)

It's just like the junk fax stuff, just make it illegal and no one will hire the spammers except for a few miscreants who can be dealt with.

Just like that's working for crack sales? ;-)

And spammers won't be able to incorporate (limit liability), open bank accounts, solicit investment money, get loans, business licenses, etc. You can't do those kinds of thing for illegal activities.

It's not like you put down "spamhaus" on your articles of incorporation. ;-) D