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Spamhaus Faces More Troubles in U.S. Courts
British-based and volunteer run anti-spam service, The Spamhaus Project, faces further court action in U.S. District Court (Northern District of Illinois) as plaintiffs, e360Insight LLC and its principal David Linhardt, seek to enforce a default judgment. Plaintiffs obtained default judgment for tortious interference with existing contractual relations and prospective economic advantage including a permanent injunction requiring Spamhaus to, among other things, remove e360Insight’s name from its database of spammers and stop blocking its email. Spamhaus was also ordered to pay US$11.7M in damages and nominal attorney’s fees. The order remains unheeded and plaintiffs now seek an order to suspend spamhuas.org.
Spamhaus initially defended the action but subsequently withdrew its answer. Spamhaus has refused to acknowledge the District Court’s jurisdiction on the basis that Spamhaus does not conduct business in Illinois. It further argues that the default judgment is not enforceable under UK law.
The initial injunction order provides Spamhaus with an opportunity to lift the injunction if the service can demonstrate, by clear and convincing evidence (a higher than normal standard of proof), that the plaintiffs have violated relevant U.S. law when sending their email.
A proposed court order would require the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and Toronto-based Tucows Inc., the Spamhaus.org registrar, to suspend the organization’s Internet service. ICANN has denied any ability to comply with the proposed order to suspend spamhaus.org and argues that only the Internet registrar with whom a registrant has a contract or the Internet registry can suspend an individual domain name.
For additional information, visit:
http://www.cio.com/blog_view.html?CID=25626
http://www.spamhaus.org/archive/legal/e360/kocoras_order_6_10.pdf