Little overkill for being a fine. He deserves a fine, but nothing that excessive. His family will remain in debt forever. How are they going to collect the money though? Good luck with that. Maybe half a million would be more within reason.

Holy [cabbage]. His children/grandchildren and their children will be in debt before they're born.

 

Exactly. This punishment is so ridiculously large, it's gonna punish those around him and they didn't have anything to do with the crime. Explain to me how that's fair?

 

 

 

The message could've been put across without this.

 

He is clearly only motivated by making as much money as possible without caring how many people suffer in the process.

 

So much for free speech... Spam might be a nuisance, but we aren't about to lock up the guy on the corner for "spamming" the public with messages of Christ.

 

 

 

 

Had he only used his own account to spam people I wouldn't have much of a problem with it. But he was using other peoples' account and baiting others in as well. He crossed the line, he deserves to be punished.

 

Perhaps a punishment is in order for phishing, but certainly not for spamming.

 

 

 

With such a severely crippling and life-long sentence, we liken his crimes to murder and theft. The punishment doesn't fit the crime.

 

 

 

Right, the crime doesn't fit the punishment but I also think they're making an example of him to try to reduce spam/phishing although I doubt it will have any real impact besides on this guy's life along with his family's.

They sure are making an example of him. And their message roughly translates to: "We don't care for your freedom of speech."

Good, he deserved that.

Holy [cabbage]. His children/grandchildren and their children will be in debt before they're born.

 

Exactly. This punishment is so ridiculously large, it's gonna punish those around him and they didn't have anything to do with the crime. Explain to me how that's fair?

 

 

 

The message could've been put across without this.

 

 

 

I agree completely. I'd rather have something around $500,000 at the most.

One word to describe this guy: owned

Holy [cabbage].

 

That's one hefty fine, I think he'll learn his lesson somehow :

 

 

 

~As for the family being in dept, they will be able to appeal this after his death, it should stand up in court, there's no reason why they'd have to carry the weight of his fine around. It's not the same as personal debt :?

I have to agree with Ginger. The fine is a painful lesson for all spammers. But I do think it is a bit unfair. His family will be working their [wagon] off for their entire lives to pay off the whole debt. I would rather have seen him given an insanely long jail sentence than to punish everyone around him.

 

 

 

Hopefully as Mylez said the family could get the fine appealed after his death. I couldn't imagine being born only to work from the moment I was able to in order to pay off a debt my great-grandfather was stupid enough to accumulate.

Seriously for spamming a website you'd never expect that much money...

 

 

 

I mean for English people (Like me) that is £545,406,755.16. The only way he could get that much money is going famous very fast or winning who wants to be a millionaire 546 times. >_<

 

 

 

Poor guy. #-o

 

 

 

This'll definitely teach a lesson to spammers.

do fines get passed down to family if he can't pay?

 

 

 

Yes it does, untill the payments over, so $873million to go.

Holy [cabbage]. His children/grandchildren and their children will be in debt before they're born.

 

Exactly. This punishment is so ridiculously large, it's gonna punish those around him and they didn't have anything to do with the crime. Explain to me how that's fair?

 

 

 

The message could've been put across without this.

 

 

 

do fines get passed down to family if he can't pay?

 

 

 

Yes it does, untill the payments over, so $873million to go.

 

 

 

That's absolutely incorrect, I don't know where this misconception comes from. Got first-hand experience since I inherited an estate roughly 8 years ago and had to go through paperwork and legal issues.

 

 

 

You can't inherit a debt unless you were directly involved in forming it (such as having a joint credit card with the deceased person, or a joint bank account/company), in which case the creditor can collect items from the will left to you and use it towards paying off the debt.

 

 

 

Since his kids haven't even been born, they have no stake in his spamming operation. It wont punish those around him either unless they were involved in the venture.

 

 

 

When you inherit an estate of a deceased person, your personal property and that of the estate are strictly separated. If the deceased has/have any outstanding debts, they will be deducted. If the debts take up the entire liquid value of the estate, you will simply inherit nothing. You will not be required to pay the deceased person's debts from your own property.

 

 

 

Being incarcerated or indebted doesn't transfer the burden of payment on your relatives or children either. It stays with you until you die.

Well, the law's different in America then because debt is just as much inherited as wealth is. Sure, creditors will deduct material worth from the debt first but the government doesn't just let debts slide, especially not ones that large. If you were a leader of the world's most powerful country, would you turn away that sorta money without some serious threat of political backlash? Imagine the public services that would pay for...

 

 

 

You can't just make money disappear. Someone has to pay for it at the end of the day. The point is, why on Earth would a judge make this huge fine in the first place? You have to wonder whether this is an attempt to grab headlines.

Not going to deter other spammers. If execution can't lower crime, what is a debt going to do?

 

 

 

He will most likely not pay the fine, therefore go to jail. Which will cost the tax payer around $AUD 40,000 a year. All his got to do is avoid big bob.

 

And if he is sent to a minimum prison he can also play xbox or ps3.

Depends, on the off chance he kills himself or dies, what are they going to be able to collect off of? They won't be able to collect anything. Half a million would've been more reasonable a fine.

Well, the law's different in America then because debt is just as much inherited as wealth is. Sure, creditors will deduct material worth from the debt first but the government doesn't just let debts slide, especially not ones that large. If you were a leader of the world's most powerful country, would you turn away that sorta money without some serious threat of political backlash? Imagine the public services that would pay for..

 

 

 

As the article states, there wasn't almost any financial loss to begin with. Facebook spent $5,000 on extra monitoring fees (probably hiring mods) and slapped the maximum penalty allowed by law, $11,000 per spam-email sent (assuming every 0.1% of spam links turn into an actual sale of marijuana/viagra, the financial value is off by astronomical sums)

 

 

 

The money wont pay for any public services, because he will never be able to pay it off. A president of any country wouldn't be turning away the money; Because it doesn't exist in the first place. A fine is an abstract, non-existing number, and it's payment solely depends on the person being fined. You can't fine a poor peasant $1 million dollars and budget it for the next political season, because he has no way to gather those resources in the first place (even if you extorted and took all his possessions by force).

 

 

 

It's purely to serve as a warning to other spammers, the abnormally high cash fine is likely designed to attract enough media attention to get the message in major newspapers and possibly TV channels. He can't pay it off.

 

 

 

"Does Facebook expect to quickly collect $873 million and share the proceeds in some way with our users? Alas, no. It's unlikely that Guerbuez and Atlantis Blue Capital could ever honor the judgment rendered against them - though we will certainly collect everything we can," Max Kelly, Facebook's director of security, wrote in a Monday blog post. "But we are confident that this award represents a powerful deterrent to anyone and everyone who would seek to abuse Facebook and its users."

 

 

 

The point is not getting him to actually pay all that money. They'll collect the few thousand dollars they can & let the case serve as caution.

When I read this topic I also pee-ed myself laughing. It serves him right.

They sure are making an example of him. And their message roughly translates to: "We don't care for your freedom of speech."

 

While I agree with you somewhat, there's a massive difference. A single message takes kilobytes or more to produce, now multiple that by the amount of people he sent it to. It takes up unneeded server space, and caused "traffic jams." Someone preaching on the street corner doesn't do that. Also worth noting is that it's probably in the Code of Conduct that you shouldn't spam.

Well, the law's different in America then because debt is just as much inherited as wealth is.

 

 

 

No:

 

 

 

 

Inheriting Debts after Death

 

 

 

According to English law you cannot "inherit" a debt unless you were party to it before the death of the debtor. However you can still be affected by someone's debts after they have died.

 

 

 

This is because when a person dies leaving debts behind, they are recoverable from his or her estate. The estate is not divided amongst the beneficiaries of a will until all of the deceased's debts have been paid. Therefore you might find yourself in debt because all the money in your spouse's estate has to be used to settle his or her debts. In certain circumstances, you might have to negotiate with the deceased's creditors to avoid losing your home, if it forms part of the estate and could be sold to cover the debts. However, if there is not enough value in the estate to cover the deceased's debts, then you are not responsible for paying them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They sure are making an example of him. And their message roughly translates to: "We don't care for your freedom of speech."

 

 

 

 

He was taking over others' accounts and using them to spam their friends. There is no freedom of speech issue here.

FREEDOM OF SPEECH LOL

 

 

 

it's not freedom of speech when it infringes on someone else's freedom, jesus christ

FREEDOM OF SPEECH LOL

 

 

 

it's not freedom of speech when it infringes on someone else's freedom, jesus christ

 

 

 

Dammit, I was just going to say that.

 

 

 

Freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom to send porn to thousands of people and abusing a website messaging system.

Viagra is not porn.

 

 

 

Freedom of speech entitles us the freedom to advertise our beliefs, businesses, etc. I can spam my list of contacts with chain-mails encouraging everyone to boycott a certain company, to accept Jesus, to visit my website, or even *gasp* to smoke marijuana. Last time I checked, I have the right to do this without legal consequences. This, although it is a nuisance, does not significantly infringe on the freedom of others.

 

 

 

Phishing and flooding, on the other hand, may infringe on other people's freedoms, and these actions should be responded with appropriate legal action. But to suggest that spam alone should warrant legal punishment is, in my view, a serious restriction of freedom of speech.

Like said above, it's almost worse than a prison term; Just about everything you have earned & will earn in the future, everything not necessary to stay alive, will go to Facebook's corporate bank accounts. Practically this guy destroyed his life, unless he has a good plan to make over $800m from scratch with no startup funds available.

 

 

 

Personally, I don't have sympathy for him. I can even understand some robbers being absolutely forced into doing what they do if their family members can't pay off hospital bills & are dying... Nobody is forced to send millions of spam emails and create headache for massive amounts of people. He is clearly only motivated by making as much money as possible without caring how many people suffer in the process..

 

 

 

Honestly, I don't think he deserved that sentence. I mean, sure, he sends four million e-mails to Facebook users, but is a minor, minor nuisance really punishable by ruining the current and future luxuries his entire family line can afford?

 

Honestly, I don't think he deserved that sentence. I mean, sure, he sends four million e-mails to Facebook users, but is a minor, minor nuisance really punishable by ruining the current and future luxuries his entire family line can afford?

 

 

 

As said before in the topic if you read it, his family cannot and wont inherit his debts unless they were a part of his company sending those spam e-mails when he dies. The debts will also not magically transfer to any of his living relatives or children while he is still alive regardless of being incarcerated or jobless.

 

 

 

I can spam my list of contacts with chain-mails encouraging everyone to boycott a certain company, to accept Jesus, to visit my website, or even *gasp* to smoke marijuana. Last time I checked, I have the right to do this without legal consequences. This, although it is a nuisance, does not significantly infringe on the freedom of others.

 

 

 

Boycotting multinational companies, accepting Jesus as your personal saviour has no direct financial rewards for you. Spamming a community largely used by underaged people with porn links, viagra ads and illegal drug selling sites is only directed towards earning the spammer's company as much money as possible without thinking of the consequences.

 

 

 

Likewise, on the streets, you can preach to people about Jesus, Buddha, Muhammad or anybody you want to. You can hand out fliers to boycott certain politicians or organizations.

 

 

 

The moment you start advertising commercial illegal services especially when directed towards minors, you lose your freedom. Viagra, marijuana and adult links are advertised for the sole reason of making personal, monetary profit. A significant part of the user base of these websites are not even of age to authorize a credit card transaction.

So basically Facebook is forcing this guy to either go suicidal or find illegal ways of finding that money.