Recently I was forwarded a magic advertisement from a couple of my non-magician friends... ads that had my name on them so as to personalize the offer.
I'll assume that there is some kind of new hacker-ware out there that allows them to snag your address book without you're knowing it... I don't know what's possible and not, but I find it interesting that this is the third time such a thing has happened and the very same names of personal friends who have nothing to do with magic, keep getting the SPAM.
This is some of the worse sort of theft I've personally had to deal with (outside identity theft... long ago, in the early days of Internetdom) not because it 'costs' me anything but the fact that my privacy has been invaded along side that of various friends & family members who did not ask to be on such lists.
THE RUB around all of this is that it seems to have begun with a "friend"... someone I've known for well over a decade, who I've not just trusted but who has referred to me as being one of his mentors. Regardless, the very first time I had this kind of event occur was through his commercial mailings, marketing a new effect or book. An act that was in and of itself a kind of betrayal but now that others have made the same fubar i can only conclude one of two things as fact;
a.) He's shared his own list either intentionally or by having it stolen
b.) Someone has created a hacking method that allows any random person to steal your contacts.
Either scenario makes me queezy.
