American internet service provider CIS Internet Services has been awarded US$11.2 billion in damages in a judgment against a Florida spammer.

The ruling was a result of a lawsuit filed by CIS in 2003 against James McCalla.  It claimed that more than 280 million spam messages were sent into the CIS network advertising mortgages, debt consolidation services, porn and more.

In addition to the charges, McCalla has also been banned from going online for the next three years.

"Email is an innovation like atomic energy or the automobile.  In the beginning, the opportunity for misuse is obvious.  For email, that's now changed," said CIS owner Robert Kramer.  "This ruling sets a new standard.  Gross abusers of email risk ridicule as well as the economic death penalty."

According to the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email (CAUCE), large amounts of spam have knocked out or disrupted ISPs around the world.  In the US, sending unsolicited commercial email is not illegal unless it is dishonest or includes a misleading subject line.

"What we need is a federal anti-spam law, such as some countries such as Australia have," said John Mozens, vice president of CAUCE.  "Spamming is illegal in Australia."