Dan Warne12 September 2006, 5:06 AM
The Australian communication regulator has raided an Australian house over claims that its resident was involved in sending billions of spam emails.
The Australian Communication and Media Authority today announced it had raided an Australian home over allegations that the resident had sent billions of spam emails.
"Preliminary analysis of the email messages contained in the spam campaign has identified that over two billion emails were sent in one spam campaign," said Lyn Maddock, Acting ACMA Chair.
"ACMA analysis to date has identified that the messages in the spam campaign primarily promoted Viagra products."
The investigation commenced after ACMA received information from OPTA, the Dutch Independent Regulator of Post and Telecommunications. ACMA said it was working closely with overseas agencies in its investigation.
In an interesting test of Australia's spam legislation, ACMA confirmed that most of the spam appeared to have been sent from overseas. However, "section 7 of the Spam Act 2003 makes it an offence for an Australian to be involved in the sending of spam if there is an 'Australian link'."
"As part of its investigation, ACMA is investigating whether there is an Australian link associated with this spam campaign."
ACMA is now analysing the materials it seized as part of its raid.
The government body said penalties for contravention of the Spam Act can be up to $A220,000 per day for first-time corporate offenders and up to $A1.1 million per day for repeat offenders.
Profits can also be forfeited and compensation paid to victims.
As the matter is still under investigation, ACMA refused to make any further comment on the specifics of the identity of the person raided, however it encouraged people to report spam to ACMA using the SpamMATTERS reporting tool which can be downloaded from the ACMA website.