A San Francisco-area man has been charged with using software to automate survey completions on a rewards-based Web site and score free merchandise from Amazon.com and other Internet retailers.
Allen Tam of Daly City CA was indicted by a grand jury on charges of conspiracy, mail fraud and wire fraud for using a robot program against FreeRide.com, an Internet site that offered visitor reward points for filling out online surveys and viewing banner ads.
The indictment alleges that Tam used source code to build software that emulated the behavior of real visitors to the FreeRide site. Between 200 and 2002, he allegedly used that bot to rack up points on the site, which he then redeemed for goods from affiliated Internet sellers.
If convicted, Tam could face up to five years in prison and a fine of $250,000 for the conspiracy charges and all but one of the mail- and wire fraud charges. But since the last alleged occurrence took place after the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Tam could face 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for that charge.
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