Spammer Guerbuez escapes $1bn fine with bankruptcy
Montreal-based spammer Adam Guerbuez has declared bankruptcy after courts in the United States and Quebec upheld a decision forcing him to pay over CDN$1bn to Facebook.
Guerbuez, who calls himself an internet marketer, compromised accounts and sent spam messages to hundreds of thousands of users. In November 2008, Californian courts fined him US $873 million. The fine consisted of $100 for each Facebook user that he spammed, along with another $100 in damages.
The fine, bought against Guerbuez and his company, Atlantic Blue Capital, under the U.S.'s CAN-SPAM Act, was the biggest ever against a spammer in the U.S.
Guerbuez said that the plaintiffs won't see the full payment, after he declared himself bankrupt. This debt has been absolved in my bankruptcy, he said. They will get a portion of it because they're included in the list of creditors, he admitted.
Guerbuez has been involved in white supremacist groups. He identified himself in 1995 as the chief media liaison for the Heritage Front, a neo-Nazi group that disbanded 10 years later.
The Montreal resident has also requested financial assistance for an appeal against the ruling. "I have only one option: Represent myself for the appeal and figure out what is needed to do the task, if I possibly can, or if someone sponsors my lawyer to take this to appeal," he said on October 13, 11 days after saying that the Quebec ruling was the last step.
He added that he doesn't have the money to fund the appeal, and needed someone who wants to see this go to appeal and would pay the lawyer themselves directly for the appeal process.
