An IDG News Service article asks a highly relevant question about the recent high-profile anti-spam activity: “Where are the Feds?” The article notes the shutdown of a spam network known as HerbalKing, in which the Feds did indeed have a hand. The FTC, FBI, and New Zealand police (in a nice show of international anti-spam cooperation), together shut down the spam network, which had been linked to a huge amount of spam email. However, according to researchers, the action was sort of like taking a cup of water out of the ocean, and within a week, spam was back to its normal levels.

The big action took place a couple of weeks later, when McColo, a San Jose-based ISP and notorious host for spammers and other cybercriminals, was shut down. But unlike the HerbalKing operation, the McColo shutdown did not involve any Federal agencies. Who was responsible for shutting it down? Researchers and reporters, mostly, who publicly humiliataed carriers Global Crossing and Hurricane Electric, who provided service to McColo. After being taken to task, the carriers dropped McColo as a client.

Interestingly, McColo was involved in providing service not only to spammers, but to criminals involved in creating botnets, and according to the article, child pornography as well. So where were the Feds on this one? Nowhere to be found, that’s where. I understand that spam and cybercrime is a big problem, and law enforcement agencies have to choose their battles–but in this case, they chose the wrong one. To date, there have been no warrants to seize McColo’s servers, which could provide valuable leads and insight into cybercrime activity.

In defense of the Feds though, most of the spammers and other ne-er-do-wells who used McColo’s facilities are located overseas, and prosecution would be virtually impossible, and it’s not even clear that McColo itself can be prosecuted for hosting the bad guys. Obviously, there’s not much that can be done about the Eastern Europe-based spammers from here, but a more focused set of laws may be in order that goes beyond CAN-SPAM. Specifically, while CAN-SPAM targets spammers, additional legislation may be required to target those who facilitate the spammers as well.