New Opt-Out Clause Makes CAN-SPAM Worse 119
snydeq writes "Three years of mulling, and the FTC has made the CAN-SPAM Act worse, writes Gripe Line's Ed Foster. Chief among the offenses in the FTC's updated rules is an even worse approach to opt-out procedures. In the future, in scenarios where multiple marketers use a single email message to spam you, 'only one of the senders — the one in the From: field — need be designated the official sender who is responsible for honoring opt-outs,' Foster writes. Translation? 'Other "marketers" who used that spam message, not to mention the spamming service that actually provided the email address list, don't need to honor opt-outs. So try as you might to get yourself off a list, the real spammer can just keep changing the designated sender in the From: field and legally keep on spamming you.' The irony of the CAN-SPAM moniker gets thicker."
Re:Genius (Score:5, Insightful)
In this case unsolicited bulk email would be illegal if you didn't follow all these rules up front. But for the guys that already got the grace period to follow the law it's been twisted just enough to be meaningless!!!
Power, telco, FCC, FAA, FDA, etc all those rule making agencies are run like this. It's just funny to see something so simple twisted so quickly. This is the same reason nobody wants internet neutrality put into law. Then any exceptions to blocking become "rules" that they "have" to block other content/providers... The telcos are already writing the rules the way they want with lots of backwards worded loopholes.
Can't render it any more impotent (Score:5, Insightful)
Damn! I guess this means an end to the three wonderful years of relief we've all enjoyed from spam thanks to the oh-so-effective initial rules.
Seriously, this change really doesn't matter, except it will let the FTC claim success due to a massive drop in the number of "valid" complaints against spammers. Whining that it weakens the existing law strikes me as similar to complaining that a serial killer violated a restraining order.
If the government won't stop them... (Score:2, Insightful)
I fully expect within the next few years we will see average Joe hacker ... as in a person who likes to fool with technology ... begin a personal and secret computer assault against any business or organization who uses the services of spammers.
In other words, if those in power won't protect me, why should I feel I am doing anything wrong to try and protect myself?
If using the services of a spammer gets your network shot down with any sort of reliable regularity, it seems logical that using them is going to become a harder and harder decision to justify. Make 40G's using the spammer, spend 37G's fixing the network damage that follows.
In the long run, I see this fight as one that cannot go any other way.
I'm impressed, in a way (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess it is no wonder that congress has managed to somehow attain an even lower approval rating than our current commander-in-chief, seeing as they managed to squirt out something like this instead of dealing with important national issues.
SPAMMERS WRITE CAN-SPAM ACT (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:More Proof That Lawmakers Don't Understand Tech (Score:5, Insightful)
Anybody who makes a sufficiently large contribution to their campaign, apparently.
Re:Genius (Score:2, Insightful)
There is only one solution: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:You Have this Completely Wrong (Score:3, Insightful)
As it stands, the majority of people who receive the 'opt-out' spam DO NOT WANT IT, which makes the solution obvious: Change the system to Opt-In. That way, those of us who want something from someone, get it, and those whose spam is unsolicited can be prosecuted.
It is ridiculous that something so problematic to day-to-day functions is treated as OPT-OUT. If you're a policy maker, how do you justify that aspect of the policy?
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Definition. (Score:4, Insightful)
However, some things are absurdly easy to define -- take freedom of speech. You are allowed to say pretty much what you want, where you want, short of "Fire!" in a crowded theater. No one has yet found a way to twist the First Amendment into meaning something it doesn't -- into somehow meaning, for example, that all speech except blasphemy is protected.
Murder is another one. Killing someone on purpose is murder, short of self-defense or actual war.
I think net neutrality is sufficiently easy to define that if we can get any law right, it should be this one. ISPs should transfer all packets to where they are addressed, with no preference given to one packet over another -- except for a specific customer, at their explicit request (if I ask for a spamfilter, they may intercept port 25.)
Granted, telcos may subvert the process, but I'd rather at least try than have no legislation at all.
Re:Definition. (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe I'm just too naive, but it seems to me that it's established such that: a) there would not be a new Church of England taking power in the US and that people can choose whatever religion they want b) people could criticize the goverment. c) people can protest when the government is being stupid. d) the press should be able to report on activities of the government without limitations.
Yet somehow in the last couple hundred years, this has evolved to mean that anything anyone wants to say is fine. That freedom of the press means the press can invade peoples lives without permission or consequence. That people can smear shit on a painting, call it art, and have that considered "protected".
Are you so sure that it hasn't been twisted? Because it's used now to protect a /lot/ more than it says it protects.
Re:Definition. (Score:4, Insightful)
How do you translate "or abridging the freedom of speech" into "people could criticize the government"? It makes no mention of the government, except in the final point, "to petition the Government for a redress of grievances", which is a separate bullet point.
In other words, the entirety of the Amendment, as it pertains to freedom of speech, is "Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech". That's a pretty clear way of saying "the Government can't legally prevent you from saying anything -- period".
Standard disclaimer applies: IANAANHIRTCIIEIJIIDYP (I Am Not An American, Nor Have I Read The Constitution In Its Entirety, I'm Just Interested In Discussing Your Point).
Re:Wrong Name for the Act. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Definition. (Score:3, Insightful)
Say what you will about historical context, but I very much doubt you can twist it (or untwist it, as you say?) to mean anything other than "The people can say whatever the fuck they want." Because that is pretty close to what it literally says.
Re:You Have this Completely Wrong (Score:3, Insightful)
You are apparently trying to protect your business from being caught by anti-spam legislation. A robust anti-spam law, such as a simple extension of the junk fax laws to cover spam, would probably destroy your business because your legitimate customers would be forced to use opt-in and not face such blacklists. Most email 'accreditation' schemes such as yours are quickly infested by spammers who use it to pretend legitimacy, whether by buying your services or by simply stealing access from people like your customers. It's the same flaw suffered by various 'micropayment' email schemes, and by Microsoft's SenderID program.
Do you see some flaw in my analysis?
Re:email is dead. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Definition. (Score:3, Insightful)
Say what you will about historical context, but I very much doubt you can twist it (or untwist it, as you say?) to mean anything other than "The people can say whatever the fuck they want." Because that is pretty close to what it literally says.
And yet the law recognises concepts such as defamation, certain types of intellectual property, incitement to commit certain crimes...
Either all these laws are unconstitutional, or the free speech right isn't completely universal after all.
I think there is a rational explanation for this apparent contradiction, which I've written about here before, but how do you reconcile these facts (assuming your previous comment was meant to be taken literally)?
Re:Definition. (Score:3, Insightful)
Omitting context ignores how language evolves over time. For example, the difference in meaning that "beg the question" has gone through from its original inception (indicating a circular argument) to its modern and common interpretation (raising a question - begging a question be asked).
It also ignores how society evolves over time - socially, technologically, etc. For the press to invade the privacy of even the President was unheard of in their time. It was a given: that doesn't happen in polite society. Today, invading the privacy of any public figure is the given, even if it takes telephoto lenses to do. It seems obvious to me that the US's first amendment was contextually referring solely to political and religious speech - areas of concern at the time from the former English rule of the colonies.