Meet Average-Joe Spammer: Interview with a Spammer

[mandy]

It's tough being an average-Joe spammer these days. Divorced and in his 40s, Mike has two kids to help support, a skyrocketing home heating bill, and a mortgage. And spamming just isn't paying the bills like it used to.

In the heyday of his spamming career, from 1997 to 2000, profiting from sending out unsolicited bulk e-mail was easy, Mike says. On an average month he made $40,000 pelting millions of inboxes with spam. Now, he complains, spam filters have become too effective and block most of his e-mail. Also, he adds, spamming for a living has become increasingly risky, as evidenced by recent arrests of--and fines imposed on-spammers. He himself is currently being sued by a large ISP for using illegal methods for sending spam, he says.

full article: http://yahoo.pcworld.com/yahoo/article/0...597,00.asp