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| Jan 4, 2008 |  |
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?Spam king? charged with manipulating Chinese stock prices
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| DETROIT - A MAN described as one of America's most prolific senders of spam e-mail was among 11 people accused in an indictment unsealed of defrauding people by manipulating Chinese stock prices.
Alan Ralsky, 52, of suburban West Bloomfield Township, made about US$3 million (S$4.29 million) through the scheme in summer 2005 alone, US Attorney Stephen Murphy said on Thursday. Federal agents seized computers, computer disks and financial records in a raid on Ralsky's home in September 2005. But Ralsky, who said at the time that he had gathered at least 150 million e-mail addresses, was not arrested then. In a 41-count indictment, Ralsky and the other defendants sent tens of millions of e-mail messages to computers worldwide, trying to inflate prices for Chinese penny stocks. The defendants then sold the stocks at inflated prices, Mr Murphy said. The defendants used a variety of illegal methods 'that evaded spam-blocking devices and tricked recipients into opening, and acting on, advertisements in the spam,' Mr Murphy said in a news release. The indictment also alleges that the defendants tried to send spam using 'botnets' - networks of computers that have been infected with malicious software coding that in turn would instruct infected computers to relay spam, the release said. 'A lot of people don't ignore or delete spam,' Mr Murphy told reporters. 'Unsuspecting people can be duped ... that they were looking at legitimate stock tips.' -- AP |
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