We could, at long last, be close to a turning point in the fight against email spamming on the internet - though it will be a long time before the war is won. It will not seem like that to online banking customers of NatWest, Barclays and Halifax who, in recent weeks, have received illegal but official-looking emails inviting them to verify their logins and codes. This is a fraud by criminals seeking to get access to customer accounts. No reputable bank would send out mass emails asking people to put secret information in a potentially public sphere.
The reason for optimism is that politicians have now realised that votes are at stake and are starting to take action. On Friday a California court fined a company $2m for sending out millions of emails telling people how they could go about spamming. This judgment came two days after the US Senate voted 97 to 0 approving the "Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing". This does not necessarily mean it will become law, but it shows the way things are going. New legislation expected to be enacted in Britain next month (implementing an EU directive) will make it illegal to send business emails or text messages without getting prior permission.
This has provoked fierce reaction from marketing companies about what constitutes permission. But it does not address the real problem, because only a tiny proportion of spam starts in Europe. It is a bit like making it illegal for pigeons to visit Trafalgar Square. Although a disproportional amount of spam originates from one US state, Florida, it could easily migrate to any offshore tax haven once the heat is on.
Some reports say the latest banking scam was run off servers in Russia and routed via a service provider in New Zealand as a cover. The point is that battle has been declared in a serious way. It can only be won using global weapons, but that does not mean it is not possible. Illicit sellers of Viagra can, in principle, be traced either from the product they sell or through the trails they leave on the internet. Battle has commenced.
