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Bill Radke: Facebook is celebrating quite a legal victory today. A California court has awarded the social-networking site $711 million in damages
in an anti-spam case. Marketplace’s Ashley Milne-Tyte has the story.

Ashley Milne-Tyte: Facebook accused Internet marketer and so-called “Spam King” Sanford Wallace of accessing users’ accounts without their permission. The company said he sent fake posts and messages to lure visitors to marketing Web sites.

Josh Bernoff is the author of “Groundswell,” a book about social technologies. He says fighting invasions of privacy is a smart business decision for Facebook.

Josh Bernoff: The company is growing so fast, the membership is growing so fast. And that growth is completely dependent on people trusting that the service is legitimate, and that the messages from their friends are actually from their real friends.

He says it’s also important for Facebook to be seen to be serious about user privacy. It’s been debating with members over how it uses their personal information.

Facebook says it’s happy with the judgment, even if it doesn’t expect to get much of the damages. Sanford Wallace filed for bankruptcy in June.

I’m Ashley Milne-Tyte for Marketplace.