President of junk e-mail company apologizes online

April 16, 1998
Web posted at: 12:13 PM EDT (1213 GMT)

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- The "Spam King" has declared himself dethroned.

Sanford Wallace, president of Cyber Promotions Inc. -- a junk e-mail company that once sent out as many as 25 million unsolicited ads, otherwise known as "spamming" -- apologized to his unwilling subjects and vowed to halt the unpopular practice.

"I will never go back to spamming," Wallace, 29, wrote over the weekend to his critics, many of them still suspicious, on an Internet newsgroup dedicated to combating spam.

"There are no hidden agendas," he wrote. "I apologize for my past actions. You folks are WINNING the war against spam. My fight is over."

Wallace said he would support anti-spam legislation, saying he was "ready to give something back to the community."

Last year, the owner of the Dresher-based company bragged about sending millions of promotional e-mails on behalf of himself and his customers.

But after six months of trying to get his ostracized operations back online and a series of legal settlements, Wallace said he was worn down.

"I'm tired. I'm going to pursue lower profile entrepreneurial ventures," he wrote. He didn't specify what that meant.

Calls to Cyber Promotions were not returned Wednesday.

Critics who complain that junk e-mail slows down genuine messages and invade the privacy of e-mail users have had mixed reactions.

"My first reaction was, well, he's been out of the business for months now, but I guess this is his declaration that he's not going to try and get back into it," said Ray Everett Church, a Washington-area lawyer and co-founder of the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail.

Cyber Promotions was considered the largest purveyor of unsolicited e-mail ads before its own Internet provider disconnected its operations.

Copyright 1998   The Associated Press. All rights reserved.