Michael Persaud and Frank Kriticos of San Diego risk sentences of up to four years and four months on charges that include three counts of disrupting computer services to cause injury and illegally using someone else’s domain name. Their e-mails offered the refinancing services of a third party company and appeared to come from Veritools, a software company. Veritools became the victim because its servers were used by Persaud and Kriticos to send the spam without its prior knowledge.
In January, two Californian students were sentenced to 27 months imprisonment for sending fraudulent spam. In December, a spammer pleaded guilty in New York to second degree forgery
California is rare in having an anti-spamming law. It is only legal to send spam in the state if the header of the e-mail identifies the message as an advert and the recipient is given a real option to unsubscribe. A breach of the law constitutes a misdemeanour. However, according to news service ZDNet.com, the law has not been enforced to date.