Microsoft Corp. filed seven lawsuits against senders of spam, or unsolicited e-mail, for transmitting messages without labeling them as sexually explicit content, the world's largest software maker said Thursday.
Microsoft said the defendants, who had yet to be identified in the lawsuit filed in Washington state's King County Superior Court, violated the "CAN-SPAM" federal law requiring e-mail containing readily viewable sexually explicit images to be clearly identified.
The law requires that such e-mails contain the label "SEXUALLY-EXPLICIT:" in the subject line and at the top of e-mail messages.
Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft said those responsible for sending the spam hacked into computers around the world to send their mass e-mailings and did not provide a way for recipients to remove their e-mail addresses from a subscription list.
"Sexually explicit materials and publications for sale in stores are required by law to be covered from view with a brown paper wrapper, and it's important that consumers are protected online in the same way," Nancy Anderson, deputy general counsel at Microsoft, said in statement.
Microsoft, which has targeted spam as part of its broader Trustworthy Computing initiative to make its software and services more secure, said it is involved in more than 100 lawsuits against spammers globally.