Ummm guys heres why it works and why they don't get closed down.
"but for one reason or another those laws aren't being enforced. "
Look password sites aren't what they used to be, I remember my friend doing his first password site posting 180 all working passwords in 1997. Now days password sites are mostly full of scams or sites run by the password sites themselfs using there own bandwidth. Only a small percentage are really passwords these days. And most die very quickly within 30 mins so the damage is minimilized
The reason password sites aren't getting closed down now is because the hosts will always accept a few complaints, I mean my mates with pass sites get 1 complaint every 3 months to his Hosting company, who then forward the complaint onto him and he emails the webmasters saying
"Your site has been removed and put into the banned list, it will never be posted again by our automated cgi program, please send me any further URL's you'd like banned so none of your sites will ever be posted on our site again"
The Hosts are very happy with this arrangement and so are the sponsors and paysite owners, if your having passwords posted to your sites by certain pass sites, just email the site owner askign to be put into his banned list. Don't go threaten them or be abusive, some of the 15 year old owners might tell you to GFY.
Most site owners will ban you by putting your URL's into there cgi programs. No more problems.
Why on earth would you sue someone when they email you that?? I mean try to close down a password site and you might do it if you contact the backbone directly and try really really hard but within 1 day that site will be back online and your URL's will be banned by the password site.
Password sites are not that bad and infact my pass site mates are working towards never posting real passwords at all just posting there own sites.
There are of course the bad password sites who go and post
10-20 passes to blacksonblondes and other major sites. They have HUGE cracked lists and just put heaps of new cracks that kill legit members usernames and the pass only works for 5-10 mins.
http://hackxxxpasses.com/index.html is one of those.
I don't support those they are bad for the industry as often they kill the password and the customer charges backs. Losing a monthly recurring sale.
I read something about the FTC being asked about password sites or something back in 1998, they said it wasn't there domain as it was a (business to business) problem. No idea if that was a reputable source or not. One of my mates was interviewed by MNBC for one of there news articles, its still floating around somewhere.
Sammy