If you are one of the more than 500,000 Facebook users who had their Facebook account hijacked by self-described “Spam King” Sanford Wallace, you can take some comfort this morning. Wallace has been sentenced to 30 months in prison and ordered to pay more than $310,000 in fines for his actions.
Sanford Wallace, who promoted himself as the “Spam King,” compromised more than 500,000 Facebook accounts between November 2008 and March 2009, sending users links to external websites that harvested their log-in credentials and friend lists. Wallace then spammed these users with links to other websites, earning money by directing traffic their way.
Wallace was one of the earliest “spam” scofflaws, as his “career” goes all the way back to the 90s, when he was sending junk faxes. (You see kids, a fax machine was a little copier of sorts that hooked up to a phone line, and…) He was hit with civil suits from Myspace, (You see kids, Myspace was…), and Facebook in 2007 and 2009 respectively. He was ordered to pay nearly $1 billion in fines, which he still hasn’t paid.
Wallace’s conviction marks the first time he’s actually been convicted of a crime. He plead guilty to one count of fraud and related activity in connection with electronic mail. The plea netted him a 30 month sentence, which is just slightly less than the 36 month maximum sentence he could have faced.
