Michael Geist - Quebec Court Enforces Facebook's Billion Dollar Spam Award

A Quebec court has enforced a billion dollar award that Facebook obtained against Adam Guerbuez, a Montreal-based spammer.  Facebook was awarded US$843 million by a court in California in 2008 and the social network proceeded to ask the Quebec court to enforce the judgment.  The court granted the request, ordering Guerbuez to pay Facebook C$1,068.928,721.46.  It also ordered Guerbuez to stop all Facebook related activity, including creating, maintaining or using a Facebook account or profile. 

This is easily the largest spam award in Canadian legal history and it places the spotlight on Bill C-28, the government's anti-spam legislation that includes a private right of action that would facilitate Canadian spam lawsuits.  In fact, the court referenced the Canadian bill as evidence that the damage award was not out-of-line with those envisioned for Canadian law, since the bill includes damages that can run up to $10 million per violation. The ability to sue Canadian-based spammers in Canadian courts has long been identified as a necessary tool to combat spam, since - as the Facebook case demonstrates - organizations currently rely on U.S. law in order to target those engaged in spamming activities in Canada.