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Sanford Wallace and passthison.com
This is a report of my research on Sanford Wallace, the one-time (and perhaps now?) owner of www.passthison.com which mirrors www.default-homepage-network.com and claims ownership to http://www.bookhugs.com/sbp.html and http://www.smartbotpro.net/
According to this excellent site http://www.greenfieldgerbil.com/~matt979/archives/002253.html Sanford Wallace (the notorious Spam King) of Cyber Promotions has a profile on Yahoo http://profiles.yahoo.com/eaglessuck2000 and he does list passthison.com as his site. This Yahoo profile is under the name of eaglessuck2000@yahoo.com and if you notice the contact info in the whois seach on default-homepage-network.com was at one time eaglessuck2000@hotmail.com. There is a wealth of information on him at Google http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22Sanford+Wallace%22
Here's the actual documentation to site ownership of passthison.com: http://www.adinfo.businessweek.com/technology/content/0009/el0901.htm
Here's the actual documentation to site ownership of smartbotpro.net: http://www.annonline.com/interviews/970522/biography.html
When I contacted SpyKillerPro about my browser being hijacked by default-homepage-network.com advertising their product, this was their reply to me:
"Hello,
You recently contacted SpyKillerPro with comments about one of our publishers. We advertise through many publishers from Sweeps to E-cards and many more. However, I believe we have tracked down the publisher that you are asking about.
Please note, we are not responsible for the actions of our publishers. Please email them in reagards to any issues you may be having with their site.
Visit the web site http://passthison.com and look at the bottom of their home page at the detailed instructions."
This seems to indicate that although the hijacking server was default-homepage-network.com, SpyKillerPro seems to be referring to passthison.com as their marketing company.
Other interesting documentation on Sanford Wallace can be found at:
http://news.com.com/2010-1071-281101.html
http://www.markwelch.com/wallace.htm
http://www.parrhesia.com/cyberpromo.html
http://dir.salon.com/business/feature/2000/08/28/metrix/index.html
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,60714,00.html
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-279208.html?legacy=cnet&st.ne.fd.mdh
http://slashdot.org/articles/03/10/20/0234215.shtml?tid=111&tid=126
http://www.loundy.com/CASES/CompuServe_v_Cyber_Promo.html
http://legal.web.aol.com/decisions/dljunk/cyber.html
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-200329.html?legacy=cnet
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,7763,00.html
http://legal.web.aol.com/decisions/dljunk/concenor.html
http://www.pestpatrol.com/PestInfo/p/passthison.asp
According to anything I can find, he's now a nightclub owner (Plum Crazy Nightclub, Rt. 11, exit 15 off the Spaulding Turnpike, Rochester, NH, http://www.clubplumcrazy.com) and goes by the name of DJ MasterWeb, enjoying his millions he made off spamming. Sanford purchased this club from Walt Rines a couple of years ago. But this doesn't explain why a "retired" spammer seems to still own several currently active websites which are known for spamming and hijacking, which he has admitted to owning in the past. According to recent statements, Wallace has thrown in the towel and stopped his spamming practices since 2001. This may be possible if he's sold his business to someone else, but it remains questionable to me until I actually find some documentation stating that he no longer runs them. Did he sell them to long time friend and former spamming partner Walt Rines?
Also, the Rochester Chamber of Commerce lists the contact for Plum Crazy as Mike Cayer, not Sanford Wallace, who owns it. http://www.rochesternh.org/showaddress.asp?cat=199&alphabet=r default-homepage-network.com showed the contact person for the site as being registered to Mike Cayer before their whois information was changed on December 15th.
Sites attributed to being owned by Walt Rines are Quantum Communications http://www.quantumcom.com, Global Technology Marketing (several of these so I don't know which one is his site), Odysseus Marketing http://www.odysseusmarketing.com/, Targit Interactive http://www.targitmail.com/, and IEMMC. Sanford Wallce owned Cyber Promotions, co-owned Global Technology Marketing with Rines, and was a member of IEMMC.
Six years ago, the FTC conducted a hearing on spamming with Sanford Wallace and Walt Rines present: http://www.langston.com/Fun_People/1997/1997AUO.html It doesn't appear that much came of it. Granted that was six years ago but spam has been around a lot longer. It's worth a read. A followup was sent to the FTC, presumably by owner Walt Rines: http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/privacy/wkshp97/comments2/nrx01!.htm listing their code of ethics they planned to follow when spamming. I don't think they were ever implemented and their site no longer exists (iemmc.org)
For more informative research and
information on this company, please visit
http://www.webhelper4u.com/CWS/defaulthomepagenetwork/passthisonftpexploit.html
and the accompanying links at the bottom of the page.
IMPORTANT UPDATE: Great news!! It seems all our hard work has paid off! The FTC has brought a case against Seismic Entertainment. Hopefully this will be the downfall of these notorious companies and an example to those currently practicing unethical internet marketing. Read the case here: http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=124892&threshold=3&commentsort=0&tid=123&mode=nested&cid=10471703
News articles and public opinion
can be found here:
http://netrn.net/spywareblog/index.php
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/nm/tech_spyware_dc
http://www.theunionleader.com/articles_showfast.html?article=45220
http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/technology/story/1719298p-9530248c.html
http://news.com.com/FTC+takes+aim+at+alleged+spyware+distributor/2100-7350_3-5403438.html?tag=cd.top
http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/10_8special2.htm
http://www.thewmurchannel.com/news/3794373/detail.html
PDF versions of the case can be found here: http://www.cdt.org/privacy/spyware/spywiper/
For all those who have been victimized by these companies, this is the day we've been waiting for. Let's keep our fingers crossed that justice will be done.
This website will be updated regularly with any new developments. Anyone wishing to contact me for inquiries or to relate their experiences may do so at nomorespyware@yahoo.com.