Spam is back in the news, and it has a new name. This time it's voice-over-IP spam, and it has the clever name of "spit" (spam over Internet telephony). Spit has the potential to completely ruin VoIP. No one is going to install the system if they're going to get dozens of calls a day from audio spammers. Or, at least, they're only going to accept phone calls from a white list of previously known callers.
VoIP spam joins the ranks of e-mail spam, Usenet newsgroup spam, instant message spam, cell phone text message spam, and blog comment spam. And, if you think broadly enough, these computer-network spam delivery mechanisms join the ranks of computer telemarketing (phone spam), junk mail (paper spam), billboards (visual space spam), and cars driving through town with megaphones (audio spam). It's all basically the same thing -- unsolicited marketing messages