I was glad to see this article on www.news.com today. I don't know if
it'll help slow down the flood of cybersex invitations that I get
*from* AOL addresses to my lists, but I can always hope:

*****************************
AOL files suit against spammer
*****************************

By Erich Luening
October 2, 1997, 6:50 a.m. PT

America Online (AOL) is fighting against spam in federal court with a
suit against a Las Vegas-based company which the online service
provider claims has repeatedly sent unsolicited junk e-mail to AOL
members despite repeated requests to stop.

According to the suit filed this week, the spam company Over the Air
Equipment used deceptive practices, including falsifying e-mail
transmission data, to avoid AOL's mail controls and to repeatedly
transmit vast amounts of unsolicited e-mail to AOL members.

The uninvited e-mail included a link to adult entertainment sites that
feature "cyber stripper" offerings on the Web. To further confuse the
AOL subscribers, Over the Air Equipment copied an America Online
trademark fraudulently suggesting that their site had AOL approval,
the suit alleges.

In a statement, AOL senior vice president and general counsel George
Vradenburg said the company is telling junk e-mailers, "You will
finally have to take responsibility for your deceptions, your
trickery, and your counterfeiting."

The AOL suit claims that despite repeated demands to Over the Air
Equipment to cease and desist, the company continued to use a variety
of deceptive practices including forging e-mail headers and
counterfeiting routing information to escape detection.

In addition, Over the Air Equipment blatantly ignored AOL members
requests to be removed from the company's spamming lists and continued
to transmit unwanted junk e-mail to frustrated subscribers.

A representative of Over the Air Equipment said the company had no
knowledge of the suit. He offered no further comment.

 ==========================================================================

This posting is provided to the individual members of this  group without
permission from the copyright owner for purposes  of criticism, comment,
scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of the Federal
copyright laws and it may not be distributed further without permission of
the copyright owner, except for "fair use."

FLW
 ==========================================================================