RSSAOL Goes Digging for Spammer's Gold
By Nate Mook | Published August 16, 2006, 5:25 PM
AOL's efforts to seize money from a convicted spammer has led the company to the front yard of a home in Massachusetts. Buried in the earth are gold and platinum bars Davis Wolfgang Hawke purchased with his illicit earnings, AOL believes.
A $12.8 million judgement was won last year against Hawke, but AOL has been unable to locate him and collect the payment. Hawke was reportedly raking in $600,000 per week at his operation's height, and invested the cash in gold and platinum in hopes it would be harder for authorities to take.
Hawke's parents claim the bars are not located on their two-acre property, and plans to fight AOL's plans, which were approved by a judge. The company is preparing to start digging with bulldozers and geological teams. AOL said it will try to be as unobtrusive as possible.
This isn't the first time AOL has made a spammer pay up. Last year, the company seized a fully-loaded Hummer H2 and nearly $100,000 in cash and gold bars, which it gave away in a contest. AOL claimed that spammer had used 40 computers to send out a million spam e-mails each day.
At a height in 2003, AOL mail servers blocked 2.4 billion spam e-mails each day. That number has since dropped thanks to efforts to fight the problem.
AOL previously issued a terse warning to spammers sending unsolicited mail to the service. "AOL will find you and sue you. And AOL will do everything it can to make sure its members end up with any money you made as a spammer."
I am all for Spammers being held responsible for their crimes. However I am afraid a very bad precedent is being set when Judges allow a company or person to go after family members to obtain the damages awarded them, because they cannot locate the person who is responsible for the crime. There is no proof that the gold is present on the family's property. And the family did not commit the crime. This is similar old English law when an entire family was held responsible for a single persons debt and sent to debtors prison. Think about it, do we want something like that to occur again? What is next?
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|Why doesn't AOL go after the spammers, sue them, take 10% or something plus the court fees, then literally give the rest back to AOLers in the form of instant rebates on thier bills?
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|"Why doesn't AOL go after the spammers, sue them, take 10% or something plus the court fees, then literally give the rest back to AOLers in the form of instant rebates on thier bills?"
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Brilliant idea. Let's have all ISP's do that including yours. AOL and Microsoft are probably the two most aggressive in going after the spammers as I recall. But, I think I know where you're headed with this.
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|Microsoft has put a bounty on Virus makers, I believe. Their offering rewards for any information.
Now I'm not a fan of either MS or AOL, but I love where these companies are going with this. I also like the idea of rebates. Spammers cost web masters like me hundreds of dollars in bandwidth each year, why should we not get some of it back?
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|they should charge £1 per spam message that get through
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|If I'm corrent thats 1 pound... a $1 is worth more ... :P and I say $10 per spam, $100 per virus.
1 British pound = 1.8904 U.S. dollars
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|1 British pound = 1.8904 U.S. dollars
Wouldn't that mean 1 USD is worth less? Yeah, I know. I'm a jerk.
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|It would indeed be less. I'm jerk #2.
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|1 pound is worth 1.8, so 1 USD is worth 1 U.S. dollar = 0.527927357 British pounds
So no, it wouldn't... :)
So if I had 1 USD for every spam message, I'd have more money then the guy with 1 pound for every spam message. Following? :)
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|Interesting use of math ...
If 1 pound = 1.8 USD Then
//British 1 Pound penalty
1.8 USD "equivalent" per spam
//1 US Dollar Penalty
1 USD per spam
Tell me again how the USD is worth more??????
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|That's totally awesome. I hate AOL, sure, but I hate spammers 1000000000 times more.
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|Hah, I reported that nearly 10 hours ago in the one before last AOL article.
/smugness
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|Hey AOL....
I have a dead cat in my yard that was bought with spam money. Do you want to dig it up and then give it away as a contest prize??? It's a gold and platinum cat nammed H2.
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|I will if AOL don't.
Gold and Platinum you say, could make a nice fireplace ornament.
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|That's excellent news. If he was legitimately accused then the parents should back down. They are defending a spammer....that's almost as bad as defending satan.
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|whats so bad about satan :S
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|He made some big mistakes when he was young and since then he carries a really bad rep.
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|Satan is the god of the underworld if I am correct.
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|He ain't god of anything. He's never been to the underworld or hell or whatever, but rest assured he's going there soon ;-)
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|Huh?
EDIT: Now that I think about it, the one I'm thinking of is SatURn, I think. The one one of our gas giants is names after.
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