AOL Employee Gets Prison Time for Selling Account Holders Emails
to SPAM Organizations
NEW YORK — A 25-year-old former America Online employee who admitted he became a cyberspace "outlaw" when He sold all 92 million screen names and e-mail ajddresses to spammers was sentenced Thursday to one year and three months in prison.
"I know I've done something very wrong," Jason Smathers told U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein as he apologized for a theft that resulted in spammers sending out up to 7 billion unsolicited e-mails.
"The Internet is not lawless" was the lesson of the case, said Assistant U.S. Attorney David Siegal. "The public at large has an interest in making sure people respect the same values that apply in everyday life, on the Internet," Siegal said.
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