How is it legal to conduct spyware intrusions? Are they not any laws on the books that bar this type of behavior?

I don't think it is legal at all. If it is it shouldn't be.

Does anyone know what penalties can be inflicted on a company that uses spyware to invade privacy

It's ilegal, read this site- http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/ ... ware_x.htm

The problem is that spyware, like spam, normally originates from countries outside of the laws governing them. Therefore there really is no penalty that can be inflicted on them.

I agree that that could be the biggest reason.

I just wish there was a better way of imposing the laws. But I'm not willing to give up my privacy and anonymity in order for it to be done.

It's not even a case of privacy. I believe that the only laws regarding viruses and spyware exist in the US-perhaps the UK too. They do not exist in Asia and India, and the majority of the world in fact. Privacy being taken away would not help in this case unfortunately.

britjojo, are you sure it's not illegal there? I would hoep that all of Norht America, Australia and Europe would have laws in place, if not many more countries.

I guess waht I meant britjojo is that in order for them to catch people, would they not have to invade someone's privacy? I just think that opens up a whole new can of worms. Innocent before proven guilty here in North America.

But I may be wrong, that may not be how they catch these people.

The spyware infections that you may or may not have experienced are normally down to the users own fault. Spyware can be installed by browsing a website containing porn, warez or anything malicious or can be installed via software programs you have downloaded and installed yourself in the past. I do not know of spyware that just arrives and installs by itself. If spyware did install by itself i would not call it spyware , it would more than likely be called a virus, again to get infected by a virus you would have to receive that data somehow to become infected. It all happens on the users behalf except microsoft exploits , this is a whole new ball game.

It didn't really make since at first but I mean you do get most of that stuff through surfing and downloading. I have never really heard of it happening through a company.

Spyware usually originate at some offshore location by some foreign entity so the US government can't do much about it. Alot of the time, they sell the information they gather to US companies though. The government should crack down on that.

Yeah it sucks that someone can just put this garbage on your computer. And get away with it, the laws on this should be throughly improved.

If you want to be extremely malicious, the same will work in reverse. Vindication isn't really my cup of tea however, but people that code these things should be given nothing short of the death pena- no, wait, that's a bit severe.

The problem is that it has never been an easy thing to trace the identity of a spyware source. Since the internet world is a complex world you may never trace them on most cases however on some cases people had successfully traced and arrested them.