Two men have been jailed for their part in an email scam that threatened the systems of major internet providers, US authorities said yesterday.
Steve Shklovskiy and Yan Shtok, both 23, devised a way to use personal computers to harvest email addresses in September 1999.
They then sent over 50 million emails asking recipients for a $35 (£23) "processing fee", in exchange for a chance to work at home stuffing envelopes. More than 12,000 people were fooled.
Major internet providers - including AOL and AT&T - were besieged by customer complaints and their systems were threatened by the overload.
The two men were sentenced to two years in jail on 27 December - just over a year after they pleaded guilty to fraud charges. Two others were sentenced to probation in July.
Shklovskiy and Shtok were also ordered to pay more than $100,000 (£67,000) in "restitution" - and, under the terms of their plea agreements, required to reveal to the internet providers how the scheme was accomplished.
Useful links
Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email
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