China, the nation that is by most accounts second only to the US in terms of contributing to the amount of spam floating around the Internet, has signed up to a global crackdown on spam. China announced it will join international enforcement efforts against spam by adopting the London Action Plan on Spam Enforcement Collaboration.

"We have long been keen to engage with China on the issue of spam, in particular because China is probably the second biggest source of spam in the world," said UK ecommerce minister Alun Michael in a statement.

"As China reaches the 100 million internet users mark, we welcome this opportunity to work with China to make the internet safer for users."
This move is a welcome one for China to make, having been seen in the past as something of a spam haven. In the past, a large amount of spam traffic was directed via China, even if those profiting were based elsewhere, due to a perceived weakness on the part of the Chinese government when it came to doing something about it, or even acknowledging the problem. This recent move shows China to be coming some way to embracing its place in the global network that is the Internet.