The self-proclaimed Spam King, Sandford Wallace, has been sentenced to 30 months in jail for a Facebook spam campaign conducted between November 2008 and February 2009.
Wallace hacked approximately 550,000 Facebook accounts and used those accounts to post spam messages to users’ walls which directed their Facebook followers to webpages which harvested login credentials and other personal information.
For each account that was compromised, Wallace gathered details of the users’ friends and posted spam messages to their walls. Wallace used an automated script to sign into the hacked accounts and post spam messages. In total, more than 27 million spam messages were sent via those accounts. Wallace was allegedly paid for sending traffic to websites via the spam messages. Wallace’s activities earned him the nickname “Spamford” Wallace.
It has been widely reported that Wallace was a career spammer, having first made a business out of spamming in the 1990’s with a company called Cyber Promotions. The company was reportedly sending around 30 million spam emails a day.
Wallace had been found guilty of Internet offenses in civil cases in the past, resulting in a fine of $4 million in 2006 for use of malicious popup adverts and a fine of $230 million for phishing attacks via MySpace in 2008. This is the first time the spam king has received a criminal conviction for his online activities.
Wallace was indicted in 2011 for the improper accessing of Facebook accounts and for sending unsolicited adverts on three occasions, spread over a period of 4 days. He was banned from accessing Facebook, yet violated the court order resulting in a charge of criminal contempt of court. Wallace was released on a bond, and while he was due to be sentenced in December, the case had to be delayed after two of Wallace’s lawyers quit.
The Spam King’s campaigns have resulted in him being ordered to pay more than $1 billion in damages, although Wallace was unable to pay the civil fines.
Wallace was convicted of one count of fraud and related activity in connection with electronic mail and one count of criminal contempt. The Office of the United States Attorney for the Northern District of California recently announced the sentence, which was passed down by Judge Edward J. Davila.
In addition to the jail term, the spam king has been ordered to pay fines of over $310,000. Wallace could have received a maximum jail term of three years. Wallace will also be required to undergo 5 years of supervised release once the sentence has been served. That sentence begins on Sept, 7, 2016.