"It's bad enough that spam pollutes our e-mail boxes and invades our privacy, but the consumer protection and economic problems it creates go much deeper," said Lockyer in a release. "Con artists use spam as a high-tech crowbar to open the door to fraud and ID theft. And this computerized junk mail costs businesses billions of dollars every year. Fortunately, my office and the Federal Trade Commission were able to shut down this operation, which in just one year flooded computers with almost 2 million spam messages. I will continue to work cooperatively with federal regulators, the high-tech industry, businesses and others to try to stem the spam tide."
Lockyer and the FTC in April 2005 filed the 13-count joint lawsuit against Los Angeles residents Rick Yang and Peonie Pui Ting Chen, and the spam operation they ran under the corporate names Optin Global, Inc. and Vision Media Limited Corp. After the lawsuit resulted in a freeze on their assets and temporary restraining order stopping their unlawful spam, the defendants went out of business.
The case marked the first joint state-FTC action brought under a federal CAN-SPAM Act (Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act) that took effect January 1, 2004. Lockyer also brought the lawsuit under California's anti-spam law. Though largely preempted by the federal statute, the state law provides additional remedies by allowing the Attorney General to seek civil penalties and liquidated damages for violations.
