The scourge of spamming has very few winners who prey on hundreds of millions of potential victims every year in the hope of stealing their identity, data, private information and peace of mind.
Every day consumers can find their e-mail with dozens of messages littered with spam but thanks to sophisticated improvement in spam detection technology, large e-mail account providers such as Yahoo, Gmail and Hotmail have been able to curb spamming of inboxes to a virtually non-existent level.
Yet, spamming can be an unstoppable nightmare as spammers can steal information such as user’s e-mail identities and other personal data from social networking sites and classified ad sites such as Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, and Craigslist.
Prosecutions and punishments for spammers have not been a serious matter until now and spamming is still treated as a harmless activity compared to serious crime such as hacking which can lead to serious consequences such as jail time and hefty fines.
However, victims of spamming can suffer just as much due to long term mental health problems resulting from constant and almost daily barrage of spam, a constant anxiety over culprits who might successfully breach e-mails and operating systems and steal private information without one’s knowledge.
Perhaps the biggest costs associated are for internet service providers who have to face all the junk the traffic volume thereby raising operating costs for them as well as their customers.
Forums such as UN, WTO, G20 and G8 should be used to forcefully create regulations which would help curb spamming and treat it just as seriously as dangerous hacking. Jail sentences for hackers and spammers should be then stiffened with even a possibility of international extradition if the spammers originate from a foreign country. Special attention should be paid to countries like India, Brazil and United States which are leaders in spamming.