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Proposing SPAM Laws and

Other Legal Ways to Deal with SPAM

"What are we going to do about spam? It was a deceptively simple question posed by CNN's Lou Dobbs to a panel of software company chief executives discussing policy with top government officials.

As expected, the CEOs denounced unsolicited commercial e-mail and some used the opportunity to talk up their company's anti-spam products.

· Digital credentials are one antidote to the growing problem, suggested Bill Conner, CEO of Entrust. "At some point, you won't accept non-credentialed e-mails," he said.

· Borland Software's CEO Dale Fuller suggested erecting economic barriers. "If you're going to put out a piece of junk, we're going to charge you."

· Network Associates' CEO, believes some kind of penalty should apply to spammers.

But squashing spam has no easy single answer. After all, Congress has tried to pass anti-spam legislation since 1995.

While the first federal anti-spam law may be on its way to reality, many anti-spam advocates say it won't stem the flood into e-mail users' in-boxes. The Senate unanimously approved the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing (CAN-SPAM) Act. The bill provides the following:

	Requires senders of marketing e-mail to include a return address so the consumer can tell them to stop.
	Requires that an unsolicited advertisement be clearly indicated as such, and that it contain a valid physical postal address.
	Prohibits false and deceptive headers and subject lines so that consumers can identify the message source and ISPs can identify the high-volume senders of spam.
	Imposes monetary damages against spammers who employ automatic harvesting and dictionary attacks using computer-generated e-mail addresses.
	Calls for enforcement by the Federal Trade Commission, state attorneys general, and ISPs, including the possibility for multimillion-dollar judgments.
	Directs the FTC to recommend a nationwide "Do Not E-Mail" list modeled on the "Do Not Call" list. Bulk e-mailers would be prohibited from sending e-mail to a person who has opted out.

"Today, the Senate has sent the message that the government is going on the offensive against kingpin spammers," said Ron Wyden (D-Oregon), a sponsor of the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act (CAN-SPAM), after the Wednesday night vote. "Americans are tired of just watching and fretting over in-boxes clogged with unwanted e-mail, and this legislation is an important step toward giving them more control."

Violations of the bill's conditions could result in criminal and civil penalties, including a one-year prison term, a civil lawsuit, and a $1 million fine.

Do Anti-spam Laws Have a Dark Side?

Small-business owners disagree on what stance Congress should take on spam, with some saying unsolicited e-mail should be banned and others defending it as a valuable marketing tool.

A national do-not-e-mail list would hurt small companies trying to market their products to new customers; some small-business owners told a House subcommittee on Thursday. Others disagreed, saying spam is growing at an exponential rate and needs to be stopped.

The hearing was before the Small Business Committee's Subcommittee on Regulatory Reform and Oversight.

Frustrations over the amount of spam received by an Internet T-shirt sales business finally drove the owner to sell the business. "You could say spam finally shut me down," said Bruce Goldberg, founder of Weathermen Records, based in Farmers Branch, Texas. "If the problem continues to grow at the rate it currently is growing, it will be impossible for businesses to rely on the Internet and e-mail as a form of communication." At one point, his business got 15 spam messages for every 1 legitimate e-mail. A spam filter cut the ratio only to 3 to 1. "The hard part was distinguishing the legitimate e-mail from junk, as I have to treat each new e-mail as a potential customer," he added. "Even as careful as I was, I would still lose customers by accidentally deleting their messages."

A national do-not-spam list would be a "disaster" for small businesses because most true spammers won't abide by the list, but legitimate small businesses will, he said. "You'll see customers frustrated because they're getting less and less e-mail from their favorite companies, but no less spam," one man said. "Remember, spammers are lawbreakers. They're not going to take their list and match it and clean it against this list.

A representative of the Federal Trade Commission, charged by the Senate bill with looking into a do-not-spam list, said the FTC opposes a registry. Unlike the national Do Not Call telemarketing list that took effect in October, a do-not-e-mail list would be tougher to enforce because it's so easy for spammers to hide their identities. The key concern about this do-not-spam [list] is enforceability. "These are not people who pay a lot of attention to legal rules."

The FTC supports national spam legislation instead of state laws, because the Internet does not have borders. The long-term solution may be more technological than legislative.

The Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail

CAUCE, or The Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email, is an all volunteer organization, created by “Netizens” to advocate for a legislative solution to the problem of UCE (spam). The founders realized that technology alone can not stop junk e-mail. As long as there is an economic incentive to send junk e-mail, users and internet service providers will need some legal recourse to stop the growing flood.

For more information about this organization or to find the latest news about SPAM legislation, check out their website: www.cauce.org