Editing Spamming (section)

===History===
The earliest documented spam (although the term had not yet been coined<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/01/weekinreview/01ZELL.html | work=The New York Times | first=Tom | last=Zeller | title=Ideas & Trends; Spamology | date=1 June 2003 | access-date=20 February 2017 | archive-date=11 August 2016 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160811230943/http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/01/weekinreview/01ZELL.html | url-status=live }}</ref>) was a message advertising the availability of a new model of [[Digital Equipment Corporation]] computers sent by Gary Thuerk to 393 recipients on [[ARPANET]] on May 3, 1978.<ref name="npr">{{Citation | url = https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90160617 | title = At 30, Spam Going Nowhere Soon | type = interviews | first1 = Gary | last1 = Thuerk | first2 = Joel | last2 = Furr | website = NPR.org | publisher = NPR | access-date = 2018-04-06 | archive-date = 2019-04-21 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20190421105924/https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90160617 | url-status = live }}.</ref> Rather than send a separate message to each person, which was the standard practice at the time, he had an assistant, Carl Gartley, write a single mass email. Reaction from the net community was fiercely negative, but the spam did generate some sales.<ref>{{cite web |url= http://www.templetons.com/brad/spamreact.html |title= Reaction to the DEC Spam of 1978 |publisher= Templetons |access-date= 2013-09-03 |archive-date= 2013-07-30 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20130730073440/http://www.templetons.com/brad/spamreact.html |url-status= live }}</ref><ref name="sfc">{{cite news |last=Abate |first=Tom |date=May 3, 2008 |title=A very unhappy birthday to spam, age 30 |work=San Francisco Chronicle |url=https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/A-very-unhappy-birthday-to-spam-age-30-3285410.php |access-date=May 19, 2023 |archive-date=May 19, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230519125750/https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/A-very-unhappy-birthday-to-spam-age-30-3285410.php |url-status=live }}</ref>

Spamming had been practiced as a prank by participants in [[multi-user dungeon]] games, to fill their rivals' accounts with unwanted electronic junk.<ref name= sfc/>

The first major commercial spam incident started on March 5, 1994, when a husband and wife team of lawyers, [[Laurence Canter and Martha Siegel]], began using bulk [[Usenet]] posting to advertise [[immigration]] law services. The incident was commonly termed the "[[United States Permanent Resident Card|Green Card]] spam", after the subject line of the postings. Defiant in the face of widespread condemnation, the attorneys claimed their detractors were hypocrites or "zealots", claimed they had a [[free speech]] right to send unwanted commercial messages, and labeled their opponents "anti-commerce radicals". The couple wrote a controversial book entitled ''How to Make a Fortune on the Information Superhighway''.<ref name=sfc />

An early example of [[Nonprofit organization|nonprofit]] [[fundraising]] bulk posting via [[Usenet]] also occurred in 1994 on behalf of CitiHope, an [[NGO]] attempting to raise funds to rescue children at risk during the [[Bosnian War]]. However, as it was a violation of their terms of service, the ISP [[Panix (ISP)|Panix]] deleted all of the bulk posts from Usenet, only missing [https://groups.google.com/forum/#!search/citihope$20orphan$20bosnia three copies]{{citation needed|date=September 2018}}.

Within a few years, the focus of spamming (and anti-spam efforts) moved chiefly to email, where it remains today.<ref name="Templetons.com" /> By 1999, Khan C. Smith, a well known hacker at the time, had begun to commercialize the bulk email industry and rallied thousands into the business by building more friendly bulk email software and providing internet access illegally hacked from major ISPs such as Earthlink and Botnets.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Conway|first1=Andrew|title=Twenty Years of Spam|url=https://blog.cloudmark.com/2014/04/11/twenty-years-of-spam/|website=Cloudmark|access-date=April 11, 2014|archive-date=April 17, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140417101600/http://blog.cloudmark.com/2014/04/11/twenty-years-of-spam/|url-status=live}}</ref>

By 2009 the majority of spam sent around the World was in the [[English language]]; spammers began using automatic translation services to send spam in other languages.<ref>Danchev, Dancho. "[http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=3813&tag=rbxccnbzd1 Spammers go multilingual, use automatic translation services] {{Webarchive|url=https://archive.today/20120708112555/http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=3813&tag=rbxccnbzd1 |date=2012-07-08 }}." ''[[ZDNet]]''. July 28, 2009. Retrieved on August 31, 2009.</ref>