Technology is not one of his strong points, softly down to his age.
Clarkson: 'I WILL find and KILL the spammers who hacked me'
Motormouth Top Gear star Jeremy Clarkson has joked he will kill the spammers who took his Twitter account on a joyride to tout dodgy diet pills. Several tweets appeared on his feed promoting miracle weight-loss medicine. But the stunt may backfire on the Twitter-jackers: rather than delete the spam and reset his password, …
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 11:06 GMT ChrisBoy
I don't mind being compared by age...
... if that's all that's being compared.
I know how the internal combustion engine works, am quite at home with all kinds of technology and work with a fine and varied selection of programming languages, old and new.
That I have anything more than greying hair in common with the dundus who does more than most to make the celebration of wilful ignorance 'fun' would be a slur, to put it mildly.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 12:15 GMT Peter Gathercole
Re: I don't mind being compared by age...
I have an working knowledge of an internal combustion engine as well, but I don't have greying hair in common. This is despite my being only about two months younger than Jeremy, and is neither because I am bald nor is it because I use dye.
I sympathise with my follicaly or pigmentaly challenged compatriots.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 12:21 GMT djack
Re: I don't mind being compared by age...
I don't think you're being fair there. He has his viewpoints and they may be polarised to yours, that doesn't necessarily make them invalid or willingly ignorant any more than yours are.
Quite often his belligerence, when not exaggerating for entertainment purposes, is due to him actually believing what he is saying is right. Importantly, he is willing to change his opinions if they are shown to be wrong. The whole bank account details thing is a case in point. He believed that 'the experts' were over exaggerating the problem and needlessly scaring people and throwing seemingly pointless obstacles in the way of daily life. Believing himself to be right, he didn't just grandstand but put his money where his mouth was.
He was shown to be dead wrong. Did he dissemble? Did he go on the defensive or on the offensive? Nope. Unlike many, he quickly acknowledged the reality of the situation and changed his opinion.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 16:30 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: I don't mind being compared by age...
"I don't think you're being fair there. He has his viewpoints and they may be polarised to yours, that doesn't necessarily make them invalid or willingly ignorant any more than yours are."
Anyone with right wing views is labelled ignorant or reactionary or some other right-on putdown for anyone the "liberal" (read: totalitarian stalinist) lefties disagree with since they can't handle their naive world view being challenged and don't handle criticism well.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 16:53 GMT Ted Treen
Re: I don't mind being compared by age...
You're absolutely spot on.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" is not a phrase which trips easily off a leftie's tongue.
You're much more likely to get the shrill hectoring tones of Harridan Harman denouncing you as some sort of *ist, the slayer of babies & the fount of all the world's travails instead.
Classic leftie style: If you can't beat 'em, sling loads of crap and see how much sticks.
It's really rather frightening how often that a lie or inaccuracy is repeated a few times and then becomes effectively an incontrovertible fact - Are you listening, BBC, Grauniad, Citizen Toynbee, inter alia?
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 20:55 GMT Gordon Fecyk
"Classic leftie style?"
Classic leftie style[...] It's really rather frightening how often that a lie or inaccuracy is repeated a few times and then becomes effectively an incontrovertible fact.
Like, say, "Obama is a muslim?" That's not exactly "leftie style" yet it is incontrovertible fact among certain sects of non-lefties.
Where's the foot-in-mouth icon?
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 19:40 GMT LionelB
Re: I don't mind being compared by age...
"Anyone with right wing views is labelled ignorant or reactionary or some other right-on putdown for anyone the "liberal" (read: totalitarian stalinist) lefties disagree with since they can't handle their naive world view being challenged and don't handle criticism well."
Anyone with left wing views is labelled totalitarian stalinist or some other reactionary putdown for anyone the "conservative" (read: fascist nazi) establishment disagree with since they can't handle their naive world view being challenged and don't handle criticism well.
There, fixed that for you.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 20:19 GMT Richard Jones 1
Re: I don't mind being compared by age...
Sorry LionelBee-in-your-bonnet you fixed what exactly? Or did you not like your heroine Harlot Hariman being brought into the discussion.
Just for the record I would be very happy to bring back public executions for those setting out to destroy the lives of others - that prat in charge(?) of the libelous demagogs for example and if you ask very nicely we might squeeze you in at the end of the event. Sorry it has to be the end, we would not like the paying punters frightened off would we?
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 17:08 GMT dcluley
Re: I don't mind being compared by age...
I too have the grey hair. My recollection of the Clarkson Bank Account details affair is that he only published the same details that anyone who writes a cheque publishes: bank sort code and account name and number. Charity direct debits are easy to set up by anyone giving correct details of an account not necessarily their own.. The Direct Debit system allows for incorrect payments to be reclaimed which, if I remember aright, was done in Jazza's case. All in fact worked as intended.
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Thursday 21st February 2013 02:54 GMT Allan George Dyer
Re: I don't mind being compared by age...
@dcluley, it might have "worked as intended", but that is not the same as being a well-designed, secure system. Could a criminal set up a direct debit to a front company just using the same details? Could a criminal set up direct debits to a charity, then take the money from the charity because it is poorly administered (concentrating on its intended purpose)? How difficult is it to reclaim an "incorrect" payment? Do the banks care that their weak system allows their customers to be robbed?
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Friday 22nd February 2013 09:18 GMT djack
Re: I don't mind being compared by age...
"Did you see him that time they had to build a Caterham?
WIlfully ignorant. To the point that it was embarassing to watch."
What, you mean where he's putting on an entertainment show, playing the incompetent clown?
Put him in a different context where he is giving his opinion not just comedic* entertainment and he has a totally different set of apparent values.
If you took almost everything on TG at face value, you would believe that all three of them could barely stand each-other and take great delight in endangering/humiliating the others. Watch the episode when Hammond comes back after his near-fatal crash - that mask significantly slips there.
* Remember, comedy, like many other art-forms, is a subjective thing.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 10:09 GMT fixit_f
Silly man
He loves to threaten and annoy people. Which, you have to hand it to him, is pretty courageous given that the location of his house near Chipping Norton is public knowledge. Last time I went past he didn't have anything in the way of defenses up either, well unless you count an old fighter jet in the front garden....
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 11:45 GMT Psyx
Re: Silly man
"He loves to threaten and annoy people. Which, you have to hand it to him, is pretty courageous given that the location of his house near Chipping Norton is public knowledge. Last time I went past he didn't have anything in the way of defenses up either, well unless you count an old fighter jet in the front garden...."
I believe he owns a shotgun and once punched Piers Morgan in the face, if that helps his credentials in standing up for himself.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 10:21 GMT LPF
Re: Stupid little boy
Big boys don't post AC! for a start ...
But hey how about using your intelligence if you have any for just one second. Unless you have someone who is actually being threatned what crime has he committed idiot! Your so stupid and eager to be with the "In Crowd" that you did nto even think about the trite PC rubbish you posted.
I could threaten to kill "Charlie Brown" , does not mean I have comitted a crime , unless you know, 1) he exists, 2) I meant that person.
So why don't you step away from the keyboard and wait for school holidays to end.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 12:00 GMT Roger Stenning
Re: Stupid little boy
Not to mention s.16, Offences Against The Person Act, 1861, which provides...
"16 Threats to kill.
A person who without lawful excuse makes to another a threat, intending that that other would fear it would be carried out, to kill that other or a third person shall be guilty of an offence and liable on conviction on indictment to imprisonment for a term not exceeding ten years."
Mr. Clarkson said (words to the effect that) he'd "find them and kill them". Doesn't matter if he was quoting someone or something, he's made the comment in a manner where it's possible that someone could actually believe that he's going to set out to do it. And that, children, is an offence.
He really, truly, has to learn to curb his voice of his incredibly stupid and thoughtless remarks somewhat drastically. The consequences of his carrying on regardless could be profoundly embarrassing to him, at the very least, and drastically lifestyle-changing at the worst, if the law decides to do something about it.
While we're on the topic of life changing events, let's also not forget that the kind of organised folks who hack these accounts tend to have strong ties to some of the less friendly mutual benefit societies around the globe, many of which don't give two hoots about putting two (frequently more) rounds into the head of journalistic types, with or without provocation.
And no, while I'm most definitely not a fan of his, I wouldn't want to see him catch lead for being a complete fool.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 12:29 GMT a cynic writes...
Re: Stupid little boy
"...Doesn't matter if he was quoting someone or something, he's made the comment in a manner where it's possible that someone could actually believe that he's going to set out to do it. ..."
er..no. The Act you quote requires intent ("...a threat, intending that...") which be hard to prove given he's quoting a film. I think they could do him under the s127 of the Communications Act but the DPP's guidelines for s127 suggest it would need to be a credible threat - so even that is touch and go.
Of course the biggest problem would be identifying the "victim" - who if they did come forward would have to admit to a criminal offence themselves.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 12:58 GMT koolholio
Re: Stupid little boy
Seperate fact from perception:
I am not a lawyer... but
1) Whilst it may be an exemption to commit crime (within reason) for the purposes of detecting or preventing crime.
2) I do question if his supposed 'threat' could be classed as righteous rage.
3) How Mr Clarkson conducts himself publicly has been called into question before.
Perception: Mr Clarkson is somewhat right to be angry, as I'm sure most users of any service would be, had it happened to them? However I dont believe any 'threat' to be withstanding, since there doesnt seem to be evidence within the article, of 'pre-meditation' or a 'realistic means' of carrying out the supposed 'threat'... given the expected 'heightened emotional response' that would come from such?
I could be wrong about all of that though, simply because I am not familiar with any specifics surrounding the instance, but its just suggestion.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 14:07 GMT Psyx
Re: Stupid little boy
"let's also not forget that the kind of organised folks who hack these accounts tend to have strong ties to some of the less friendly mutual benefit societies around the globe, many of which don't give two hoots about putting two (frequently more) rounds into the head of journalistic types, with or without provocation."
Fortunately, this isn't a nation where journalists get shot in the face by criminals for saying rude things about them.
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Thursday 21st February 2013 01:29 GMT veti
Re: Stupid little boy
Well - not really. Because the law you quoted says "intending that the other would fear it would be carried out...".
In other words: the test is what Clarkson intended them to believe, not what they took it into their heads to believe. It would be trivially easy for his lawyer to argue "my client is well known for shooting his mouth off about all kinds of things and has never been known to follow through on a threat of serious violence, there was never any question that anyone would seriously feel threatened by him."
At which point, there's no case to answer, and no evidence to suggest otherwise. Indeed, if required, I'm sure the lawyer could come up with several other examples of the defendant making similar threats in a similar tone, none of which were ever meant seriously.
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Friday 22nd February 2013 11:48 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Stupid little boy
Asked a former police colleague about this one, he said the purpose is that say for example someone tried to say kick out a window with the aim of criminal damage or robbing the contents of whats behind it, but the glass is far too strong to be kicked out (i.e. making the crime impossible), they can still be prosecuted. So you can probably threaten to kill Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Linus (not Torvalds!) or any other peanuts character you wish with immunity from prosecution.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 11:42 GMT Phil W
I think the point Roby was making is that it's not about him being a celebrity but more about the fact that since he's paraphrasing a well known film, it becomes far more obvious that it was not an actual threat.
Just like if I said that my opinion of Apple was "to nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure", most people would realise I was paraphrasing a film quote and not actually intending to engage in a nuclear weapons attack in Cupertino.
Where as if I said "Off to see some dodgy Russians later to buy a nuke to blow Apple HQ up" it would be far easier to think I might actually try and do that.
Regardless, the bit where he says "Unlike some people, I WILL find who hacked my account." adds a serious context to threat and should land him in trouble.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 10:18 GMT jai
The headline has this text 'I WILL find and KILL the spammers who hacked me' in quotes.
I thought quotes were used when, you know, quoting what someone said. Not for when you're paraphrasing and using your own emphasis on the word KILL. And failing to include the quote from the movie which puts a more humorous angle on the rest of the quote.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 14:15 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Burn him!
I do wonder what he could have done to deserve people wanting to shoot and burn him. Some people like him, some dislike him, some accept his sense of humour.
As extreme as some people see him it is not as extreme as some of the suggestions for dealing with him.
Sounds like a funny post on twitter. Good on him
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 10:51 GMT Silverburn
Re: Burn him!
Anti-Clarkson Daily Mail reader brigade comes out to partake in their annual drive to make the World a Better Place®
Maybe they could start with the twitter hackers first...they are *genuinely* annoying. At least with Clarkson you can *choose* to watch/read his dribblings or not (which are sometimes quite funny and/or accurate).
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 10:48 GMT adrianww
Oh Good Grief...
I can't believe that I'm doing this...
It's Jeremy Clarkson boys and girls! Do you really think for a fraction of a nanosecond that he was being at all serious? As someone has already pointed out, he was paraphrasing Liam Neeson's character in Taken. Even though I haven't seen the film or know much about it, I still got the reference and was pretty sure that he was most likely just making bit of a joke of the whole thing.
And as for the bank thing, well he actually had a bit of a point there if you ask me. Simply publishing his bank details should NOT have allowed anyone to set up a direct debit or perform any other kind of transaction, other than paying in. Either the charity itself or Clarkson's bank seriously dropped the ball on that one I think. Certainly if any of the banks that I use had allowed a direct debit to be set up (or any other withdrawal to take place) without my signature or some other formal confirmation of my identity and wishes, I would have been down the branch straight away tearing the manager a new one.
So, yeah, it's Clarkson. He's a bit of a gobsh!te, plays up his anti-environment, right-of-centre persona to the hilt and is a popular target for the PC, right-on and left-of-centre brigades - many of whom seem to get themselves rather hot under the collar by taking him far too seriously and literally.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 11:00 GMT David 79
Re: Oh Good Grief...
You might want to read up about paperless direct debits. They can only be in favour of payees who have jumped through the relevant hoops (such as large charities, for example), so Joe Public can't directly empty your bank account into theirs, but there isn't much to prevent a third party setting up a direct debit from your account to, say, a charity (which is what happened in this case) without a signature or other ID. You still of course have the benefit of the direct debit guarantee should you spot the problem and wish to reverse the transaction.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 12:16 GMT adrianww
Paperless DD
Actually, I don't need to read up about paperless DD, being familiar with the process and having set up a fair few myself over the last couple of years. However, in every case where I have set up such a DD, the organization originating the request has gone to reasonable lengths to confirm that I was, indeed, who I claimed to be and was permitted to do what I was doing. Also, in each case, my bank contacted me to confirm the details once the DD instruction was set up but before any funds were allowed to be taken. So I'm afraid that in my book someone on the charity side or the bank side still dropped the ball on the Clarkson charity DD thing and should have had an ear-bending for it. Either that or he needs to get himself a better bank.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 11:40 GMT John Smith 19
Re: Oh Good Grief...
"So, yeah, it's Clarkson. He's a bit of a gobsh!te, plays up his anti-environment, right-of-centre persona to the hilt and is a popular target for the PC, right-on and left-of-centre brigades - many of whom seem to get themselves rather hot under the collar by taking him far too seriously and literally."
That doesn't bother me.
His standing invite to the Rupert Murdoch party makes me.
It suggests the amiable old misogynist buffoon is merely the surface veneer for someone much nastier.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 11:37 GMT Anonymous Coward
"Im sure Mr Clarkson will step forward and answer a charge of threatening behaviour etc if the victims are willing to step forward and identify themselves."
in person. Face to face to the person whose account they abused. Not "hacked" if they just guessed his password. Only very lazy journos and celebs could possibly say guessing "secret" is hacking, same as only amazingly silly don't change their voicemail PINs from defaults and then say they've been hacked when someone guesses 1234 might be the lucky number. People like that should join the idiots collective over at hacked off.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 11:27 GMT Destroy All Monsters
Time for copypasta
"What the f*ck did you just fucking say about me, you little bitch? I’ll have you know I graduated top of my class in the Navy Seals, and I’ve been involved in numerous secret raids on Al-Quaeda, and I have over 300 confirmed kills. I am trained in gorilla warfare and I’m the top sniper in the entire US armed forces. You are nothing to me but just another target. I will wipe you the f*ck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on this Earth, mark my f*cking words. You think you can get away with saying that sh*t to me over the Internet? Think again, f*cker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across the USA and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your life. You’re fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can kill you in over seven hundred ways, and that’s just with my bare hands. Not only am I extensively trained in unarmed combat, but I have access to the entire arsenal of the United States Marine Corps and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of the continent, you little sh"t. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little “clever” comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your f*cking tongue. But you couldn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will sh*t fury all over you and you will drown in it. You’re fucking dead, kiddo."
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 13:27 GMT Anonymous Coward
If I was going to be hunted down by a celebrity assassin
'Former Dr Who actress Karen Gillan, who played Amy Pond in the series, was stung by a similar diet-pushing spambot. She did not respond to the intrusion with threats on the lives of the perpetrators.'
I'd rather it was the lovely Ms. Gillan and not Jeremy Clarkson. It'd have more of an Emma Peel vibe to it that way.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 14:45 GMT John Smith 19
Re: If I was going to be hunted down by a celebrity assassin
"'Former Dr Who actress Karen Gillan, who played Amy Pond in the series, was stung by a similar diet-pushing spambot. She did not respond to the intrusion with threats on the lives of the perpetrators."
Beware angry ginger women.
They are not to be trifled with.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 16:10 GMT hamcheeseandonion
Re: If I was going to be hunted down by a celebrity assassin
Oooooh! Now you've done it...
ginger women and trifle...
ginger women WITH trifle....
ginger women COVERED with trifle....
all that jelly, and cream, and goodness knows where the sponge fingers go......
<Phoooot..thud>....
<right lads, that's got the pervert sedated!...well done with the dart gun Jenkins, now there's a good lad and point it the other..>
<Phoooot..thud>
.....Paris because...well..cream, jelly..who else?
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 13:39 GMT bag o' spanners
in the pedantic groove
Unoriginal Hollywooden screenwriters passing off a tired old meme as the core premise of a chronically uninspiring and unconvincing Neeson movie. Who'da thunkit?
Jeremy Clarkson saying something unoriginal and uninspiring in a lardy armchair_tough_guy fashion, totally bereft of irony. Colour me surprised.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 14:09 GMT Dom 3
OH FFS!!!!!!
Nobody "subtracted £500 from his account and donated it to a charity". That would imply that they had access to his account and had his money in their posession. No. Somebody created a DD with his details. This is about the only thing you can do with someone's bank account details. The money is safe. The only people who can DD are big trusted institutions and the money is GUARANTEED to be returned if it is disputed.
He was not "dead wrong".
I have been "giving my bank account details" to people ever since I was first issued a chequebook back in the 80s.
He was dead right. The so-called experts who make out that giving account details away is inherently dangerous are pillocks who do not understand how 419 scams work.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 15:42 GMT Stevie
Bah!
I dunno why people get so worked up about Clarkson et al. Top Gear's an entertainment show. He's paid to be over-the-top and people obviously like that because they keep watching. I sometimes can't stand that stupid singsong delivery if they're all doing it, but comments like "This is Sodom and Gomorrah with a steering wheel" make me relent pretty quickly.
I enjoy Top Gear, even though the fires are obviously staged, but I liked the "project" shows better than endless Aston Martin/Lamborghini/Porshe dick-swinging that seems to be the fashion right now.
Of course, we only get the same four dozen episodes on BBC America, so we're nearly word-perfect on the soundtracks, but anything is better than the idiot who occupies the other Non-Dr Who viewing hours 24X7 with his cooking and swearing. If anyone has outstayed his welcome it is Gordon Ramsay.
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Wednesday 20th February 2013 17:46 GMT Herby
"How hard can it be?"
To fine the spammer and kill them? Oh, this is the internet age where EVERYTHING is anonymous and the bad guys hide in the cracks like cockroaches. Maybe a small tactical nuclear strike is in order, as it would at least make me happy. Until then, one must hit the 'delete' button quite often.
Oh, it was probably the Chinese Army doing the nasty deed anyway!
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Thursday 21st February 2013 00:34 GMT Shannon Jacobs
Putting criminals out of business
If the spammers weren't making money they would be much less active.
Say, why don't ANY of the major email providers integrate EFFECTIVE and POWERFUL anti-spam tools that will shut down ALL of the spammers' inferastructure, pursue ALL of the spammers' accomplices, and help and protect ALL of the spammers' victims, even including this Clarkson fool. Easiest to imagine for email, but the basic idea is just to cut the spammers away from the very small supply of suckers who feed them.
Too busy to say more just now, though the basic ideas are explained in more detail elsewhere. Google, don't you care about reducing the amount of EVIL on your Internet? Microsoft, don't you want to beat the google to the punch by doing some good downstream? Yahoo, aren't you desperate enough to avoid bankruptcy?