Spamming Facebook Costs $873 Million
Hooray for Facebook!
Now can you get those people to quit “Super Poking” me?
Facebook won a U.S. court ruling against a Montreal spammer – who was ordered to pay $873 million dollars for sending unwanted messages to users.
Adam Guerbuez and his company Atlantis Blue Capital were ordered to pay $436.2 million dollars in statutory damages and another $436.2 million dollars in aggravated statutory damages for violations of CAN-SPAM.
Facebook began legal action against Guerbuez in August, claiming he had managed to obtain the passwords of Facebook users and was bombarding them with millions of messages about sexual products and drugs.
Judge Fogel also permanently barred Guerbuez, who lives in Montreal, and Atlantis Blue Capital from any future contact with Facebook.
“Does Facebook expect to quickly collect $873 million dollars and share the proceeds in some way with our users?” asked Kelley in a posting on the Facebook blog. “Alas, no. It’s unlikely that Guerbuez and Atlantis Blue Capital could ever honor the judgment rendered against them.”
“But we are confident that this award represents a powerful deterrent to anyone and everyone who would seek to abuse Facebook and its users,” he added.