New York teenager Anthony Greco must have thought that he’d really put one over on the man. Having just successefully sent more than 1.5 million pieces of “spim” – spam sent through an instant messenger system – to MySpace.com customers, having misappropriated MySpace.com’s instant messaging system, he then threatened MySpace.com that if they didn’t give him an exclusive marketing contract, he’d share the secret of how he’d hacked the instant messaging system and sent the spim with others, opening MySpace.com up to the possibility of a disabling flood of spim.
The CEO of MySpace.com, Tom Anderson, did, in fact, contact Greco, and the next thing he knew, Greco found himself on an airplane from New York to Los Angeles to discuss his novel and clever method for marketing hiimself and his messages.
Or so he thought.
Greco, it turned out, wasn’t so clever after all, as what was waiting for him in Los Angeles wasn’t MySpace CEO Tom Anderson, but a warrant for his arrest.
It may be the first time in history that a spammer delivered himself along with his payload of spam.
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In the meantime, experts are warning that the popularity and immediacy of instant messenger spam (spim) could make it the next big thing, sparking a spamdemic of heretofore unseen proportions.
Said Assistant U.S. Attorney Brad Hoffstadt, who was involved in Greco’s arrest, “We’re just beginning to get the tip of the iceberg. This could be a new wave as online communities start up.”
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Saying spim does not make you cool. Not only that, but ‘spim’ doesn’t even really apply to myspace. God, a fourth grader could send out 1.5 million messages to myspace customers. it’s not really a secret.