By Jeff Hampton
Two Christchurch men behind one of the world's biggest spamming operations have been hit with heavy fines under a new anti-spamming law.
The pair sent billions of illegal spam messages under the name ‘Herbal King’, selling pharmaceuticals including penis enlargement and weight loss pills.
Shane Atkinson was fined $100,000 by the High Court, with his spam partner Roland Smits fined $50,000.
The pair’s business was ranked the biggest pharmaceutical operation in the history of the internet.
They are also the first to be punished under a new law banning spam.
Keith Manch, of the Internal Affairs Department, says New Zealand is taking a hardline approach to spammers.
“New Zealand, like many other countries, isn't going to tolerate this type of behaviour going on here,” he says.
Atkinson's brother Lance, who lives in Queensland and was also involved in the scam, settled out of court paying $100,000 plus costs.
The group spread their operation over various countries, sending the spam from New Zealand, producing the pharmaceuticals in India and running the business through a firm registered in Mauritius.
The group was eventually busted by a man from Denmark. The man set a trap by requesting some penis enlargement pills and then hiding a code in the order form.
He was then able to obtain the address of the computer user and track the serial spammers back to New Zealand.
It was the beginning of the end of an operation turning over hundreds of thousands of dollars, and which at one stage produced half the world's spam emails.
At the time of the group’s arrest, they were also being pursued by the Federal Trade Commission in the US – who has seized related assets and banks accounts.
While spamming is still a worldwide problem, many are happy that some of the worst offenders are now out of action.
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