It's a SPOT specific issue cause they've priced the gear and the service so cheaply that folks who would never have bought a PLB are buying the SPOT devices by the thousands.

It's reminiscent of the early days of 911 service where local police/fire agencies were inundated with "just wanted to see if this works" calls. In the case of people activating their SPOT devices, apparently they believe that they're to be used for inconveniences, not for emergencies.

The relatively high cost and "hard to get" attributes of a PLB make them far less likely to be abused by idiots.