Microsoft files 117 phishing lawsuits

[whatthe]

Microsoft has filed 117 civil lawsuits against alleged phishers trying to scam Microsoft customers out of personal information such as credit card numbers........

Microsoft is using trademark law to target the phishers, who use the company's trademarks on their e-mail messages and Web sites.....

Microsoft has also taken action to shut down more than 1,700 phishing operations targeting its services since January 2004.

http://www.techworld.com/security/news/index.cfm?NewsID=3409

Bill's getting 'gressive.

[guardian alpha]

Now we are faced with ethical descisions. Do we support Microsoft taking the law into it's own hands and sue people who break the law into bankruptcy, or do we speak out against it?

We need to think back on how we reacted when the RIAA and MPAA took the law into their hands as well. People were sued left and right for breaking the law, but we took pity for those being sued because of how small and unimportant the crimes were in comparison to the punishment being given. People screamed for the government to step in and take action, others wanted to dissolve RIAA as a company completely.

Is Microsoft doing the exact same thing to spammers/fishers any more ethical? Both the scammers and illegal-downloaders are doing something illegal, but because illegal-downloading is something that is viewed as petty and non-harmful (read: non annoying to the masses) we should feel pity for the downloaders?

Time to make up our minds as a electronic community where we stand on this issue of corporations taking the law into their own hands.