Microsoft wins case against UK man

Company was selling email addresses to spammers

Microsoft has stopped a UK man from selling lists of email addresses to spammers.

Paul Martin McDonald sold details that were then used as spam lists through his company Bizads.

Microsoft was granted a summary judgement against McDonald, arguing that it was suffering loss and damage to the goodwill it has as operator of Hotmail.

Judge Lewison, who heard the case, decided Bizads had breached the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR), a UK law which includes regulations designed to halt the sending of unsolicited email.

'The evidence plainly established that the business of Bizads was supplying email lists of persons who had not consented to receive direct marketing mail and that it had encouraged purchasers of the lists to send emails to those people,' said Lewison.

Lewison ruled that Microsoft had suffered a loss as a result of the breach of the PECR, and was entitled to compensation and an injunction restraining McDonald from instigating the transmission of commercial emails to Hotmail accounts.

The regulations state that, except in limited circumstances, 'a person shall neither transmit, nor instigate the transmission of, unsolicited communications for the purposes of direct marketing by means of electronic mail unless the recipient of the electronic mail has previously notified the sender that he consents for the time being to such communications being sent by, or at the instigation of, the sender.'

Microsoft says the judgment is a milestone.

'This ruling represents a significant step forward in the UK and across Europe in discouraging perpetrators of spam by encouraging organisations to bring court proceedings against those who continue to conduct these illegal activities,' said a Microsoft spokesperson.

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