Pejorative term for an
internet service provider that permits or even encourages spam
mailings from its systems. The plural is `spamhausen'. There is
a web page devoted to tracking spamhausen.
The most notorious of the spamhausen was Sanford Wallace's Cyber
Promotions Inc., shut down by a lawsuit on 16 October 1997. The
anniversary of the shutdown is celebrated on Usenet as Spam Freedom
Day, but lesser imitators of the Spamford still infest various
murky corners of the net. Since prosecution of spammers became
routine under the junk-fax laws and statues specifically targeting
spam, spamhausen have declined in relative importance; today,
hit-and-run attacks by spammers using relay rape and
throwaway accounts on reputable ISPs seem to account for most
of the flow.
