Spam

Spam and Regulation of Commercial E-Mail

Federal Laws Regulating Spam

The first federal anti-spam legislation, the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003, was signed into law by President George W. Bush on December 15, 2003. The Act is effective January 1, 2004. The Act sets rules for commercial e-mail, although it makes no distinction between solicited and unsolicited commercial e-mail. Commercial e-mail is defined as "any electronic mail message the primary purpose of which is the commercial advertisement or promotion of a commercial product or service (including content on an Internet website operated for a commercial purpose."

State Laws Regulating Spam

Thirty-six states (as of December 2003) have enacted laws regulating unsolicited commercial or bulk electronic mail advertising. The federal CAN-SPAM Act preempts any state law that "expressly regulates the use of electronic mail to send commercial messages, except to the extent that any such statute, regulation, or rule prohibits falsity or deception in any portion of a commercial electronic mail message or information attached thereto." Basically, this means that state law can still be enforced for fraudulent or deceptive practices such as falsifying the origin or the routing information, using third-party Internet addresses without permission, or including misleading information in the subject line of a message. Since studies by the FTC have revealed that more than 80 percent of spam contains fraudulent information, state laws may still have an effect on solving this problem. California and Virginia state laws were particularly influential in developing the CAN-SPAM Act. The following resources are helpful to determine the law in any particular state.

The National Conference of State Legislatures - The NCSL has links to all of the spam bills by state.

Spam Laws by State - This resource was created by David Sorkin, associate professor of law in the Center for Information Technology and Privacy Law at The John Marshall Law School, an expert on spam law. See a brief summaries of the state laws and various articles.

Contributing Information to the EDUCAUSE Spam Collection of Resources

EDUCAUSE has identified links concerning Spam and regulation of commercial e-mail that may be useful to the higher education community. Many of these links have been contributed by EDUCAUSE members. If you have additional resources you would like to include on this page, send the information to contribute@educause.edu

Federal Government Resources

CAN-SPAM Act of 2003

Federal Trade Commission Spam Information Website
This site has information about the Federal Trade Commission's recent law enforcement actions against deceptive commercial email and spammers who don't honor their "remove me" claims.

Associations and Non-governmental Organizations Resources

Association for Interactive Marketing (AIM)
AIM is a nonprofit trade organization devoted to helping marketers use interactive opportunities to reach their respective marketplaces. This is their "Stop Spam" page.

The Center for Democracy and Technology
The CDT has created a "Spam, Unsolicited Commercial Email, Junk Email" page that lists various legislative spam resources. The site also includes commentary regarding spam legislation.

Direct Marketing Association
This site lays out the Direct Marketing Association's Anti-Spam Working Strategy. The DMAs goal is to combat spam while protecting legitimate e-mail marketing as an emerging and promising marketing channel.

Articles, Reports, and Other Resources

Anti-Spam Solution Overview ENT News, 2003
This guide gives an overview on anti-spam software. It categorizes vendors in several groups, and provides a short summary about how the product works along with links to more information.

CDT's Analysis of S.877 Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing (CAN-SPAM) Act of 2003The Center for Democracy and Technology, 2003
The CDT's detailed summary of the CAN-SPAM bill.

Do Not Advertise: The Current Fight Against Unsolicited Advertisements Duke Law and Technology Review, 2003
This article discusses unsolicited communications and potential solutions to the seemingly endless problem of spam.

DON'T SPEW: A Set of Guidelines for Mass Unsolicited Mailings and Postings (spam) The Internet Society, 1999
This document explains why mass unsolicited electronic mail messages are harmful in the Internetworking community. It gives a set of guidelines for dealing with unsolicited mail for users, for system administrators, news administrators, and mailing list managers. It also makes suggestions that Internet service providers might follow.

Giving E-mail Back to the Users: Using Digital Signatures to Solve the Spam Problem First Monday, 2003
This paper argues that current legislative and private attempts to stop spam are either ineffective, or involve unacceptable tradeoffs.

Report to the Federal Trade Commission of the Ad-Hoc Working Group on Unsolicited Commercial E-mail The Center for Democracy and Technology, 1998
This document reflects the work of the Ad-Hoc Working Group on Unsolicited Commercial Email.

The CRE's Six Resolutions for Responsible E-Mailers Association for Interactive Marketing, 2003

Spam, That Ill O'The ISP: A Reality Check for Legislators Competitive Enterprise Institute, 2003
This paper assesses spam and its legal and technical solutions with an emphasis on the perspective of ISPs.

Technical and Legal Approaches to Unsolicited Electronic Mail University of San Francisco Law Review, 2001
Lawsuits have been somewhat successful in addressing the most extreme instances of spamming, and a number of jurisdictions have enacted specific laws in an attempt to regulate spam. But legal approaches in general seem to have been no more successful than technical responses to the spam problem, and the primary result to date is a great deal of uncertainty surrounding spam. Ultimately, a consensus approach that coordinates legal and technical responses is likely to provide the only effective solution.

Why Am I Getting All This Spam? Unsolicited Commercial E-mail Research Six Month Report The Center for Democracy and Technology, 2003
This report explains what users can do to avoid spam.

Why the new federal 'CAN Spam' law probably won't work CNN, 2003
FindLaw's Anita Ramasastry on why the new federal spam law probably won't work.