Michigan spammer, 10 others indicted in alleged Chinese stock pump-and-dump scam

Michigan spam king Alan Ralsky , his son-in-law and nine others have been indicted in Detroit on charges of violating federal anti-spam laws, the U.S. Attorney’s Office announced today.

The 41-count indictment said Ralsky, his son-in-law, Scott Bradley, 46, of West Bloomfield, and others used unsolicited e-mail to pump up the price of largely worthless stock in Chinese companies and sold the stock reaping huge profits and leaving Internet subscribers who purchased it holding the bag.

The operation also used illegal methods to maximize the amount of spam that could be sent while evading spam-blocking devices and tricked recipients into opening and acting on advertisements, prosecutors said. This included using false headers in email messages, using proxy computers to repay span, using falsely registered domain names to send spam and misrepresenting the advertising content of email messages, prosecutors said.

Ralsky’s crew also tried to send spam using illegal botnets, a network of robot computes infected with malicious software that instructed the infected computers to send spam, the indictment said.

The most serious charges against Ralsky and the others, mail and wire fraud, carry a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. The indictment also charged the group with violating federal spamming laws, money laundering and conspiracy.