Stanford Wallace, whose spam notoriety once got him nicknamed "Spamford," has now been ordered by a federal judge to disable any and all spyware programs his current businesses have slipped surreptitiously into an undetermined number of Web surfers’ computers.
Wallace and his two companies, SmartBot.net and Seismic Entertainment, were ordered to disable the programs by U.S. District Judge Joseph DiClerico October 21, siding with prosecutors who sought the order on behalf of the Federal Trade Commission.
The FTC has made Wallace their first official spyware target, and they’re accusing him of not only slipping in the spyware but trying to sell computer users affected by it remedies called Spy Wiper and Spy Deleter, remedies the FTC has said don’t work, even at the $30 price the Wallace companies charged for the programs.
"We see it as good relief for consumers," said FTC attorney Laura Sullivan after the DiClerico ruling, though she said the FTC isn’t certain yet as to just how widespread is Wallace’s spyware. DiClerico also set a hearing for November 9 in the case.
Wallace’s Philadelphia-based attorney, Ralph Jacobs, countered that his client wants only to use the Web for lawful and proper advertising. Wallace has suggested previously that the government is all but out to get him.
"There are a wide range of advertising practices on the Internet that use some of the techniques the FTC objects to,” Jacobs said after the DiClerico ruling, “and the defendant looks forward to an opportunity to establish exactly what advertising practices are allowable."
Even if that is true, Wallace has the unfortunate problem of a reputation for mischief that precedes him. In the late 1990s, his Cyber Promotions business was so prolific a junk e-mailer, with as many as thirty million such messages a day going to consumers, he was known as the Spam King. Lawsuits from America Online and CompuServe prodded him to leave Cyber Promotions earlier this decade.
