Schwartz on Adware Advertisers

May 12, 2005 · by · in Adware/Spyware, Derivative Liability

Ari Schwartz comes out swinging against adware advertisers, saying “Advertisers, too, should be pushed to take greater responsibility for the companies they advertise with.” His remarks raise a number of questions, including:

1) Is there something unique about the adware industry, or should we make advertisers liable across-the-board for the actions of ad-sponsored media? i.e., Newspaper runs a defamatory article?–hold the advertisers liable.

2) If we want to follow the money, why limit liability to advertisers? Shouldn’t we hold investors liable for investing in adware companies? For that matter, shouldn’t we nail all of the service providers to adware vendors too? If the power company shut down the electricity to adware vendors, they would go out of business!

3) Is it possible that some social value is created through the chain of adware relationships?

The witchhunt continues….