J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

In message , VanguardLH
writes:
J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

I want to do their systems some harm ...

That would make you worse than the scammer calling you. You become part
of the problem. Until you *agree* to commit some action on your own
computer, they haven't done anything illegal to your property. At best,
they might've violated the Do-Not-Call list *if* you subscribed. Are
you going to ASK them if you can commit harm to their property as
eventually they will ASK you to grant access to your computer or ASK you
for your credit card number? What do you think will be their response
when you ask for access and permission to harm their computer(s) or
telephony equipment?

*Legally*, with the twisted legal systems in both our countries, you're
probably right. *Morally* ... well, they're wanting to do evil to me who
hasn't ... well, to use the example usually quoted in crime series I
_have_ had parking tickets, but I think have always been successful in
challenging them; whereas I'd be wanting to do evil to people who have
done evil to many and will continue. *Practically*: I'm not going to
succeed (or even try) anyway, as I don't have the necessary skills (and
CBA) - but if I did, I can't _really_ see them complaining to the
authorities ...

They have lots of money to lose if they were forced to discontinue their
operations. They'll hire lawyers and harass you in court.

I used to go to a music shop called CD Shack. Radio Shack threatened to
sue them because they claim to have trademarked "Shack". Didn't even
make it to court. The shop caved and changed their name. I forget what
it was all about but some 30 years ago someone I knew was suing
Microsoft. In court, he had one lawyer. Microsoft have 25. The judge
commanded that only 2 lawyers could sit at the defendent's bench an
voice any objections or arguments. Those two could consult the others
but the others had to stop interferring with the case. As I recall,
Microsoft successfully lured the plantiff by an out-of-court settlement.
Buffaloing by police or lawyers isn't a new tactic, and it often works.

Intending to do harm is not the same as doing harm. Only a few crimes
have "intent" laws, like intent to murder. Intent to steal your money
probably isn't directly legislated, so until you give them your money
(or credit card) and until they actually take that money or use that
credit card number then the argument about [future] intent is
conjecture. They haven't harmed you until they actually do it, not
because they might lead up to that harm with spam/scam phone calls.

Sometimes there is evidence proving intent but often it is
suppositional. If you could gather evidence of their other intents
along with evidence of actual harm (they committed their intent) and in
sufficient number then you might win in court. Well, you might win the
case but financially you would still lose in having to pay a lawyer or
an entire fleet of lawyers.

I'm reminded by users that try to send fake bounces in some uneducated
attempt to harm the spammer that spewed out their crap. These users are
generating bounce spam which incurs bandwidth and disk resources at the
ISPs or e-mail providers along with often hitting innocents (because
spammers don't give out their true e-mail address but may use someone
else's e-mail address, especially one that got harvested). Fake
bouncing can be detected since the receiving mail server did not
generate it. The user's client generated the fake spam, er, fake
bounce. Fake bounces are irresponsible and employed by users that have
no clue how e-mail works. Fake bounces are known as backscatter, and
users that receive misdirected backscatter can report it as spam (from
YOU) as well as e-mail providers can kill your account for generating
the backscatter.

People might bump into you a lot at a theme park but, as an adult, you
don't go spouting "I'll sue you" for all those assaults. Learn to hang
up your phone. Or employ one, or more, of the suggestions mentioned so
far. Passive action is the only legal action to which you have
recourse. Active action where you try to harm others puts you in the
same camp as the evildoers you're complaining about. You devolve to
their level. Just because you think a group of tall fat blacks staring
at you as you and they approach each other is not a sufficient excuse to
whip out a handgun and start firing at them. You getting scared is not
an excuse to kill. You being nuisanced is not an excuse for harming the
property of others, just as you're not allowed to shoot at others
yelling obscenties at you, either.

Life is full of nuisances. You either acquire a thick-skinned ego as
you age into adulthood (mentally if not physically) or you go hide in a
cave away from all humans.