Stay at home mom admits to be spammer
 

My understanding is that she has / does post here under the name JenC

http://www.itnews.com.au/newsstory.a...&src=site-marq

A work-at-home mother pleaded guilty this week in a US federal court to sending millions of spams hyping Internet porn sites, prosecutors have said.

Jennifer Clason, 33, of Raymond, N.H., was part of a spam gang that sent mass quantities of messages containing pornographic images, said officials from the Department of Justice. She admitted conspiring with two others, Jeffrey Kilbride, 39, of Venice, Calif., and James Schaffer, 39, of Paradise Valley, Ariz., in sending the messages, which advertised various Internet porn sites.

Clason, who pleaded guilty to two counts of violating the federal CAN-SPAM Act and to one count of criminal conspiracy, will forfeit her ill-gotten gains under the agreement she struck with authorities. She also faces a maximum of 15 years in prison.



Two other members of the gang, Andrew Ellifson, 31, of Scottsdale, Ariz., and Kirk Rogers, 43, of Manhattan Beach, Calif., have already pleaded guilty to charges under the CAN-SPAM Act.

Clason now runs a Web site for work-at-home moms, MommyJobs.com, which was not part of the investigation. According to anti-spam advocate Brian McWilliams, MommyJobs.com -- which bills itself as "a support site for other work at home mothers and others who wish to quit their jobs to be home" -- contains no pitches to join Clason's affiliate program for porn spammers (PhatBucks.com), nor to visit her porn "thumbnail" site (Galleriesblog.com) or her porn content search site (Contentshopper.com).

While MommyJobs.com lacks direct porn connections, it does advertise get-rich-quick schemes on its forums, including "auto-surf" sites. Recently, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) shut down a major auto-surf site, and charged its owner with operating a Ponzi scheme to dupe investors.

Clason came clean on the MommyJobs.com message forum in a long letter to her site visitors, but claimed she was victimised by a man who convinced her that spamming wasn't illegal. Recently, she said, she left the spamming business.

"Apparently this guy that I had trusted for five years had lied to me," she wrote. "Not only was his spam operation illegal, but he was also doing other shady stuff that I had no knowledge of like money laundering!!"

Gotta say there are some long sentences involved in spamming. A gang here in norway just got sentenced for pulling off of the largest robbery ever. They also killed a cop while heading out. The leader got 19 years while the others got 14-17.

Jensen, that is "up to 15 years". In reality, she will have to give back the money she made from spamming (what is left) and will probably get a slap on the wrist "suspended sentence" or some dumb ass community service where she has to pick up trash promotional materials on street corners or something.

US laws have teeth that are very rarely used.

Alex

I am a little on the fence with this.

Only because my PO Box and home gets all sorts of paper spam everyday. Mostly from domain registrars and anyone that I have purchased anything from. And, even though I am on the No-Call list, I still get calls from Political organizations and always the County Sheriff and Fire Department looking for donations.

And yet, it is so much easer to hit delete than to rip up the paper spam and throw it away or answer the phone to only tell the people I am not interested and to not call again.

I guess I don't understand why the Government goes after internet spammers with so much fervor and not the other spammers. A spammer is a spammer... It doesn't matter if it is email, paper mail, a phone call or even a fax.

Doesn't she run/work for Phat Bucks?

Jim, the thing with paper spam is the cost per piece - the majority of the cost for paper spam is bourne by the sender. Each piece of paper in your box represents anywhere from 10 cents to about $1 per piece AT THE COST OF THE SENDER.

Email spam is almost entirely at the cost of the receiver: Computer, internet connection, time... plus so many spammers spend their lives trying to trick you into opening their spam by using misleading subject lines, faked from addresses, and whatnot. Through strong filtering and whatnot, I have my spam per day down into the hundreds now.

If spammers were paying ever 1 cent per email to send them, most of them would not be doing it - let alone 10 cents or more per piece.

You should get after you government to do what they have done in Canada. If you put a "NO AD MAIL" notice on your mailbox, the post office will not deliver anything that isn't personally addressed. That mean that yes you will still get the credit card offers and stuff, but no, you won't get the rest of the loose junk. I can put the same symbol on my front door area, and in theory the door to door people won't drop stuff here either.

Oh yeah, spam faxes are against the law in the US last time I looked.

Alex

I agree about how bad spamming is. But the cost argument doesn't really stand up. I mean, how much does it really cost you to get a piece of email? Or even 1000 pieces of email.

The Fax spams...illegal or not, I still get them again, mostly from domain registrars. They call me a lot too as a matter of fact. I just talked to Greenie and he has a good story about a phone call spam :)

And I agree, it would be nice if you could put ""NO AD MAIL" on my mailbox and po box. But, I think if that happened, it wouldn't be too hard for the spammer to make their mail look legit. Most of them already do. And most times, they look either official or like a check.

All I am really saying is I wish the government would go after the "other" spammers as much as email spammers.

I think I was wrong saying I was on the fence. I agree that email spam is out of control but so are all the other types that I get.

Radio Teaser :D

Jim, without an internet connection, I would get no spam

Without a PC, I would get no spam.

Without an email program, I would get no spam.

I have invested thousands to be online - and my ISP and service providers have spent untold money to create the infrastructure to transport email to me.

I then have to take the time to delete it (or read it if it is sneaky bullshit subject lines that need to be looked at). Let's say 3 seconds per piece average... at 1000 pieces per day, 3000 seconds... almost an hour per day.

How much is an hour of your work time worth?

Would you tolerate 1000 phone calls per day? Would you tolerate 1000 salemen to your door each day? Would you tolerate them if they called at 3am?

It is so easy to say "just delete it"... and it is also easy to say "just don't get your mail" or "don't answer the phone".

On a scale between admail and email spam, there is no comparison... you couldn't handle 1000 pieces of paper each day in your mailbox.

Alex

Content Shopper? Isn't that baddog's thing? http://www.greenguysboard.com/board/...90&postcount=2

I also get the fire and police dept. phone "spam".

Charities like those are exempt from the Do Not Call list.

The last guy calling for one of the local PD's said "They sure do appreciate seeing that bumper sticker showing you support them when they're out on the road" I could practically hear him winking as he said it, lmao.

I always tell them that for me it's a choice between dinner, or donating, and I hope they understand.

Tom, imagine if there was no do-not-call list, and no limits what so ever. Imagine that they could call you 24 hours per day. Imagine they could call you 20 times in a row, each time claiming to be a different person, attempting to sell you the same thing. Imagine they could do this every day. Imagine they could do this without end, without exception, and could even contact you at work and ask you to buy what you have already said no to.

That is email spam.

There is little or no move on email mostly because conservative types are only willing to address "porn spam", and only at or near election time. Other than that, they are not going to address it and make it go away.

Alex

Great analogy Alex...spam is so outta control it's ridiculous. Every fuckin time you get a new filter in place...the cocksuckers find a way around it |angry|

So |spam| is bad? |couch|

Unless it is BBQ spam on a stick... then it is good. :)

Alex

Or, pan fried and served with a nice slice of sharp cheddar cheese on fresh soft white bread. That's a sammich!

Oh yes, and add a nice thick slice of vine ripened beafsteak tomato and a slice of Vidalia onion. Mmmmm good!

Because internet spam could get a hole lot bigger than mailings and phones !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There is no comparison to email spam. It is 1000 times more frequent than anything. We all get 100's of unwanted emails a day. Due to paysites I get that to 4 emails daily. Un-fucking-real. Spammers need to go away! Porn or mainstream, they all need to go. I don't want a watch, a bigger cock, a new mortgage or viagra. :(

baddog own content shopper? He does yes but she was his partner and he recently bought her out. It is all being transferred to him now he said on another board.

OH yeah it's worse in email.

I do get a phone call from "Cardholder services" once per day. I also get calls from people selling barrier and pela windows and doors once a week or so. And lots from people wanting to sell me sattelite dish service more than a couple of times a week. (I am not on any do not call lists because I dont want the governments "help" basically). Also, not a single one of their "press 2 to stop receiving these calls" actually functions! They never stop.

I also receive in my mailbox (unasked for) "Clipper" magazine once a week. For those who dont get it, it is about 2000 advertisements in the guise of savings coupons for various local merchants. There is another one I get as well which comes in an envelope, the envelope is HUGELY thick because it is PACKED with coupons and ads for even MORE merchants, lmao!

I would guesstimate that I gt 5000 us mail spams per week, packed into those 2 unwanted and unasked for mailings.

So heres a question, would it be more aceptable to people to receive one HUGE email spam with 2000 ads in it? I think it would, because it's only 1 delete compared to 2000 seperate deletes. Although it might take an hour to download from a mail server..


For me, I object to any form of personal advertising if it continues to come after I've told them to not send them again. Once is not spam to me.

Tom, if all my email spam cam eonce a day in a format I could easily delete in one shot, I wouldn't have an issue. When I just came back in the house, in front of my door is the "publi-sac" (which I call publi-crap, but there you go) with a week's worth of at my door spam in one easy to toss bag. I rarely open it, so most of the time it is a direct to recycle sort of a deal.

I can handle that.

What pisses me off is the people who come to the door and hang things on the doorknob, tape things over the keyhole (make sure I take it, I guess) or otherwise pollute my front door area. I have no mailbox (Canada post only does gang-boxes for new areas now), so they have nowhere else to put it. You always see that crap blowing in the wind, making the neighborhood dirty. They are annoying.

Email spam is a pain because most good spammers spend their time trying to defeat the filters. Ads for Le\/itra and vi@gr@ and this week the 1000 spams for the stock UMSY (pump and dump time) use any one of a million different ways to get past the filter and into my face. These people should (literally) be shot on site, scheming little bastards.

Alex

Does'nt JenC also own adultblogindex? I find it hard to believe she would be lead to believe spam was okay. Unless it was talk to get a reduced punishment.

I agree spam is way out of hand, really annoying. As mentioned, if people who dont mind spam got a 1,000's letters a day in their home mailbox, they would sure say something about it. How much time I've wasted going through e-mail each day.

ronnie

Clearly JenC didn't think spam was okay. She did what most people do. Oh my I'm sorry, I was told it was ok. I was seduced by that guy. I should have known better. blah blah blah.

She spammed, she got caught. Bad for her.

I think you guys are being a little hard on her

let me make this clear

I have never sent any ad emails or any kind of spam to anybody

but really what damage did Jen do
a bunch of people had to take 10 seconds to hit the delete button
nobody was hurt, nobodys property was stolen or damaged

I think this whole thing about email spam is sort of stupid

if you dont like it buy a filter

the goverment is perfectly ok with Junk mail

and that requires
trees to be cut down
tons of ink to be used
creates millions of tons of garbage (which is paid for by tax dollars)
takes more time to sort thru and throw out then email spam
the mail man has to bring all that junk mail to everyone houses (which is paid for by tax dollars)

why are they ok with it because they are getting 20 cents or so for each peice of junk mail

on top of it she is a single mother who wants to work at home to be around her kids

She violated a highly publicized federal law. That's her bad. It would take a lot to convince me that she really thought what she was doing was legal. It's unfortunate that she decided the rewards for breaking that law were worth risking her freedom and the future of her children. I've got to roll with Ramster on this one. She knew better and she's just regretting the hell out of it now.

I would add this as well: Any single spammer, provided they are not the type that cluster spams, isn't what I would consider as a huge problem individually.

I think of them as the punk on the corner downtown with a squeege trying to guilt people into giving them money. A single one is an amusing annoyance.

Now, picture that there is 100 squeege people on each corner. Every time you stop your car for 1 second,20 of them jump on the hood all trying to clean your windshield and steal your cash.

Finally, you stop driving because your car is now useless.

Spam is like that to me: So many spammers send out so much spam over and over again, repeating the same few subjects, watches, software to stop spam, pills, penis patches, and pump and dump stock scams seem pretty much to be it. Thousands of pieces per day of total, overwhelming shit.

It is enough to make me want to turn off email and not use it again.

I won't let these fuckers ruin the internet for everyone. JenC can go to jail and learn something from it.

Alex

I dare ya :D

Am I the only one that thinks she was told that the lists she was sending to were double opt in & legal & all that crap?

I wouldnt doubt that she was told that, dont know it, but wouldnt doubt it. This is why we (and others) dont take ANY email traffic whatsoever. Don't care how "legit" people think it is, just dont want it period. If we find it, we terminate it.

So wanting to be at home with your kids should allow you to break federal laws that everyone else has to abide by or pay the cost? I can't even begin to bite on that theory.

also I didn't see any thing about it being porn spam

I am sure if it was the article would have said so

Alex no offense but your analogy is sort of dumb but lets say its the same

there's 100 squeege people on the corner and when the cops arrest em what happens

a fine or some other slap on the hand but Poor Jen
(I dont know her)

is/was facing real jail time

the same could be said for graffiti
1 person writes his name on the wall and its not really a huge deal
but hundreds do it and the city looks like shit

plus it takes a lot of time and effort to remove that stuff

but what happens to the graffiti artists that get caught
a slap on the hand

all I am saying is let the punishment fit the crime

If so, she obviously didn't make a very good legal case for herself.

I am willing to say the punishment they hand down for these cases is pretty fucked up, but that's no surprise. Sexual predators wander the streets on probation while spamtards sit in federal fuck-me-in-the-ass prisons for 10-15 years. The leveed jail terms appear to have been designed for the monster spammers running 10 email servers out their basements. She was working cahoots with two other spammers though, so who even knows what kind of operation they were running?

thats why i use a mac and spamarrest - nothing but my friends , clients and family emails get through. Its the asian spam that is the worst!
ALOHA

I'm not trying to pick on you Tommy, cause I really don't have the balls to do that :D , but...From the article:

I am not saying that she should get away scott free

but cmon.... nobody was hurt, no property was damaged

spaming isnt any worse then spray painting your name on a bridge

but because the politicians have a hard on for the internet
its a 5 to 10 year prison term

get caught spray painting your name on a bridge and I bet its a 200 dollar fine, MAYBE they might make you spend a day washing the shit off

Tommy, no problem - let the punishment fit the crime. For invading without permission the personal space of 1 million people (assume that many got spammed) - 1 minute of a jail time for each person bothered.

It was apparently porn spam as the article refered to her "porn spam program Phatbucks". I wouldn't be shocked to find it that it was both porn and mainstream spam.

Comes out to about 2 years give or take.

Greenguy, I can almost live without it now, most people I know send me PMs, contact me through IM type programs, or by hotmail... my email is almost entirely a dump for spam at this point.

PR_Tom: She may or may not have known, but at the end of the day, you are responsible for your own actions. Ignorance is rarely an acceptable defence.

Alex

I really dislike spam, but I too have a beef with the punishment. It's far more severe than necessary. If they really want to dissuade a financial venture like spamming, then punish them financially. And it comes right down to what you said about the government having a hard-on for the internet. They don't know how to control it, so they go insanely overboard. Of course, they do so knowing that their aol subscribing constituants are mindlessly cheering them on. If someone was spamming phishing schemes or shit like that, that steals from the unsuspected surfer, then prison terms would make a lot more sense to me.

Yes they are Alex. Illegal to the tune of USD500/fax in fact. If you live in a state where the state has also legislated against fax spamming, make that USD1,000 (or thereabouts) per fax.

How do I know this? I built a document assembly system for my client who makes a living from suing spam faxers & mass broadcasters. Wish I lived in America, then I could make a healthy living out of getting spammed! :P Im not up on the other spam modes, but figured this might be interesting to anyone who gets spammed bad via facsimile.

No, she isn't a mom. On her mainstream site for stay at home moms that seems to be the biggest issue she came clean about. She has no children.

And yes, she says it was porn spam.

Now whether or not she believed it was legal, I certainly don't know. As I'm pretty sure none of us will ever know all the facts of this case. Just because some "reporter" says something surely doesn't mean it's true does it?

The problem with email spam isn't necessarily that I get a few spam emails

One problem is that kids get porn spam and I don't see how anyone can say "it's just spam" to that issue.

Another problem is that companies and individuals are forced to spend a lot of money to combat the spam and, because of spam, viruses as well and now spyware type programs. If you add up all the time I spend battling "spam", that's a ton of time I could have been spending on my business or on my relationships.

In my opinion, the biggest problem with spam these days goes far beyond the emails we receive. Here's what's currently happening that we don't even think about or even know about.

We all receive hundreds and thousands of gallery submissions every day of "cheaters".. One such group that I tracked down, redirects via GEO IP thru chhits.com. This site then redirects to some TGPs and also fake "galleries" that installs "spyware/malware" on their computers. One of the guys involved with this also sells spyware removal programs which, actually installs more. This spyware/malware then creates a huge base of "zombie" computers which these spammers then use to send out their spam.

Spam is much more than the few emails we receive in our inboxes.

There are many excellent posts in this thread. We, as internet marketers, walk a very fine line when discussing marketing tactics.

Can anyone really define spam? So you receive unrequested email, big deal, so what? If you don't like it just stop using web based email. The internet is public realm.

Maybe we should jail ad execs at Budweiser, Proctor & Gamble, General Motors, etc, etc. I don't request TV commercials either, but hey, they shove them in my face anyway. They are spamming the public airwaves. En masse! But that's my problem, I'm using public facilities by choice.

As soon as 'they' (our collective government bodies) figure out how to tax spam it will be as legal as can be. Spammers don't go to the expense, time or trouble just to personaly piss you off. Out of so many emails sent some moron will buy a "genuine Rollecks watch".

For the record, I detest spammers. But I detest censorship and "big brother" control even more. I'd rather tolerate spam than risk being the next do-gooder target. The next time you jump on the anti-spam bandwagon you may be cutting your own throat.

later ................