Correspondence with Spammers: Greatest Hits
Every spam message I receive is an opportunity to file a complaint with the Federal Antimonopoly Service. Here are the highlights of their investigations — featuring lies, forged documents, and corporate dishonesty.
Editor's Context
This article is an English adaptation with additional editorial framing for an international audience.
- Terminology and structure were localized for clarity.
- Examples were rewritten for practical readability.
- Technical claims were preserved with source attribution.
Source: the original publication
Late 14th century, unknown artist: The FAS commission examines a spammer's excuses.
I rejoice when I receive spam — because it gives me a new opportunity to replenish the budget of my beloved country (where the money for pensions, hospitals, schools, duck houses, and all that comes from). Every message I receive from spammers, I carefully forward to the FAS (Federal Antimonopoly Service), giving it the opportunity to replenish the budget by an extra 100,000 to 500,000 rubles, and then I enjoy the investigation materials that shed light on the dirty underbelly of "respectable businesses" and their accomplices. Lies, document forgery, and every stop along the way — enjoy!
1. Russian Standard Bank and the Robocall
According to written explanations from Russian Standard Bank, the disputed phone call was the result of a technical error when dialing. While making a phone call to subscriber number <...>, whose owner is a client of Russian Standard Bank, the bank employee making the call made an error in one digit and as a result — mistakenly called number <...>.
The lies didn't help — Russian Standard Bank was found guilty of distributing spam with an aggravating circumstance: using means of automatic selection and/or dialing of subscriber numbers without human participation (auto-dialing, automated mass messaging).
2. A Moscow "Orthopedics and Neurology Clinic" and a "Unified Information Center of Moscow and Moscow Region"
Individual entrepreneur Vorobyova I.E., calling on behalf of the "orthopedics and neurology clinic" (operating in the legal form of an individual entrepreneur, sure), reported that she did not distribute advertising to the number of an unknown subscriber. IE Vorobyova I.E. also stated that the facts set forth in the Decision contain no indication of the time, place of the event, or the applicant's full name.
Vorobyova was caught lying via call detail records and found guilty of spamming. The same unenviable fate befell IE Zabalkanskaya I.B., who presented herself as the "Unified Information Center of Moscow and Moscow Region" and also lied that she never called anyone in Moscow, was sitting quietly fixing primus stoves in her Vologda Region. Never called anyone either time, and the enemies must have planted the call records through the ventilation shaft.
3. A Moscow Dental Clinic or Cosmetologist That Turned Out to Be an LLC from Smolensk
The LLC didn't tell FAS anything interesting, but somehow attracted the attention of the Federal Tax Service, which — ta-da! — discovered false information about this shell company in the national register of legal entities.
4. The Eternally-Closing Sunlight Jewelry Chain
With a seductive (my personal assessment) female voice, they tried to lure me before March 8th to yet another "liquidation" of Chinese light industry products, even though I have neither a bulldozer nor an excavator — and then staged a game of detective at the FAS hearing.
According to written explanations from Solnechny Svet LLC, the subscriber with phone number <...> is not in the Company's client database, and the Company did not make the disputed phone call. From the explanations of Solnechny Svet LLC, it follows that the disputed phone call was made by PJSC VimpelCom independently under contract No. 775728198 dated November 23, 2020, concluded with Solnechny Svet LLC.
What follows is a lengthy excursion into the intimate life of amphibians and reptiles, called the service
Didn't work out, no luck: in the case under consideration, from the aggregate interpretation of the contracts presented in the case materials, it was established that the phone call in question was made specifically by Solnechny Svet LLC. With all the consequences: found guilty of distributing spam with aggravating circumstances of auto-dialing.
5. Youla (Mail.ru LLC) and the Email Spam
As part of the case, Mail.ru LLC provided written explanations stating that the disputed advertisement was sent to the applicant by mistake. The same lies were heard by Roskomnadzor, which was examining a complaint about Mail.ru LLC's illegal processing of my personal data. In both cases, Mail.ru LLC was found to be in violation of the law ("On Advertising" and "On Personal Data") with all the consequences.
And now for a magic debunking session — or rather, an explanation of Mail.ru LLC's "mistake." About two years ago, I registered on Youla and literally the next day deleted my account (quite a quest it was — I had to correspond with the support service, which responded to the request to delete the account with: why?). The account was deleted, but my email address stayed with Youla and somehow, by "mistake," ended up in their spam database. So much for ceasing personal data processing upon the subject's request, right.
6. How Beeline Sent Me SMS Spam and Lied to FAS That I Asked for It
PJSC VimpelCom presented a sample contract form that was in effect at the time of concluding the contract with the applicant, due to the loss of Contract No. <...>. PJSC VimpelCom claims that the aforementioned contract form for Beeline communication services contained a field stating that the subscriber agrees to receive advertising information from PJSC VimpelCom and third parties. This condition contained an alternative option — a "disagree" field where, if the subscriber did not wish to receive advertising, they had the opportunity to make the appropriate mark.
But it's not that simple, because I've been through this before: the applicant presented a copy of Contract No. <...> in the case materials, which did not contain the aforementioned "do not agree to receive advertising information" field; moreover, the applicant had no opportunity when concluding and signing the Contract to check a box indicating disagreement to receive any advertising, including from PJSC VimpelCom.
Translation into plain language: PJSC VimpelCom (brand name Beeline) lost (or says it lost) its copy of the contract with the subscriber and presented FAS with a forgery — a contract form that was supposedly used with all clients at the time, but I still have my copy of the contract and it says something entirely different. Beeline has attempted this trick with FAS at least twice and it has never worked, but they're persistent — they keep trying.
The Moral
The moral is simple: if a business is unscrupulous about one thing (sending spam), it's unscrupulous in general — it will twist and turn, shift blame to others, lie to regulatory authorities, hide behind shell companies, and use forged documents.
Why This Matters In Practice
Beyond the original publication, Correspondence with Spammers: Greatest Hits matters because teams need reusable decision patterns, not one-off anecdotes. Every spam message I receive is an opportunity to file a complaint with the Federal Antimonopoly Service. Here are the highlights of their i...
Operational Takeaways
- Separate core principles from context-specific details before implementation.
- Define measurable success criteria before adopting the approach.
- Validate assumptions on a small scope, then scale based on evidence.
Quick Applicability Checklist
- Can this be reproduced with your current team and constraints?
- Do you have observable signals to confirm improvement?
- What trade-off (speed, cost, complexity, risk) are you accepting?
