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We’re proponents of “opt-in” marketing — email and other contact a consumer requests.  Unfortunately, as unwanted email continues to flood consumers’ Internet services, the Federal Trade Commission has just tightened up email restrictions.

Four new provisions to the federal government’s CAN-SPAM rule were approved by a 4-0 vote yesterday.  The plain English version of the new provisions:

1)  Someone sending email cannot require payment or additional information beyond the email address for a consumer to demand that their email be removed from the organization’s future efforts.

2)  There are new ways to identify who sent an email if multiple organizations are advertising in that same email.

3)  One for the businesses (and a good one too that we use):  Organizations can provide a mailing address that is a post office box or similar postage handling service to identify the company’s location.

4)  When is a person not a person?  When a “person” is an email recipient.  Email addresses, not people, are protected by CAN-SPAM.

On a related note, the folks at StopPoliticalCalls.org continue to do great work with their free list to tell politicians not to call.  While the country’s attention is naturally focused on the presidential race, there will be many races in local and state governments and candidates who use “robo-calling” to automatically call consumers.  These calls are NOT covered by the federal Do Not Call Registry.

When we last checked in with the folks at the free don’t call me registry, multiple political candiates and members of Congress had taken the organization’s pledge to not call consumers on the list.  Those candidates are in states as diverse as Missouri, North Carolina, Kansas and Idaho.  Even one of the companies supplying the service has agreed to honor consumer wishes.

It’s not too late to register free and make sure your phone number is protected from unwanted political spiels during dinner.

Posted under Privacy

The Federal Trade Commission has brought a permanent halt to four illegal spamming operations – including one that offered the opportunity to “date lonely wives” and two that hijacked the computers of unwitting third parties and used them to pelt consumers with graphic sexually explicit e-mail. The FTC charged the operators with sending spam that violated provisions of the CAN-SPAM Act, and has halted the illegal spamming.

The CAN-SPAM Act requires that a spam e-mail contain accurate header and subject lines, identify itself as an ad, and include the sender’s postal address. It also requires that the spam give recipients an opt-out method, so consumers can elect not to receive messages from the spammer in the future. To ensure that consumers are not exposed content they do not wish to view, the Adult Labeling Rule requires that senders use the phrase “SEXUALLY EXPLICIT: ”in the subject line of sexually explicit e-mail messages and ensure that the initially viewable area of the message does not contain graphic sexual images. The consent agreements announced today settle charges that the spammers violated the CAN-SPAM Act, the Adult Labeling Rule, or both.

Cleverlink Trading Limited and its partners will give up $400,000 in ill-gotten gains to settle FTC charges that their spam, or that of their affiliates, violated federal law. The agency charged that their “date lonely wives” spam violated nearly every provision of the CAN-SPAM Act. It contained misleading headers and deceptive subject lines. It did not contain a link to allow consumers to opt out of receiving future spam, did not contain a valid physical postal address, and did not contain the disclosure that it was sexually explicit. It also included sexual materials in the initially viewable area of the e-mail, in violation of the FTC’s Adult Labeling Rule. A U.S. District Court judge halted the illegal spamming at the FTC’s request and froze the defendants’ assets. The settlement announced today ends that litigation. The settlement with Cleverlink, Real World Media, Brian D. Muir, Jesse Goldberg, and Caleb Wolf Wickman bars future violations of the CAN-SPAM Act and the Adult Labeling Rule and requires extensive monitoring of their affiliates for future violations. They also will give up $400,000 in ill-gotten gains.

The FTC charged that Zachary Kinion sent spam hawking adult sites, mortgage rates, and privacy software and paid other spammers commissions to send spam messages for him. The FTC charged that he hid his true originating address by routing his spam through the computers of innocent third parties. The FTC charged him with violations of the CAN-SPAM Act, and a district court judge ordered a halt to the illegal spamming, pending trial. The settlement announced today ends the litigation. The settlement bars him from sending e-mails that contain false or misleading header information, misrepresent the subject matter of the message, fail to include an opt-out option, fail to include a postal address or fail to disclose the spam is an ad. The order contains a judgment of $151,000 – the total amount he made from his illegal spamming – which is suspended because of his inability to pay. Finally, it requires that he monitor any affiliates for CAN-SPAM Act violations.

One spam operation used “spam zombies” – computers used without their owners’ knowledge or consent – to conceal the source of the sexually explicit spam. The FTC alleged that the defendants did not have authorization to use the “zombie”computers and that their spam violated provisions of the Adult Labeling Rule that prohibit sexually explicit images in the initially viewable area of an e-mail and that the label “SEXUALLY EXPLICIT: ” appear in the subject line. The settlement with William Dugger, Angelina Johnson, and John Vitale calls for them to give up $8,000 in ill-gotten gains and bars them from violating CAN-SPAM and the Adult Labeling Rule. It also requires that before they use third parties’ computers to send spam, they must obtain authorization from the computer’s owner and inform the owner how the computer will be used.

Another operator was a professional “button pusher,” who used spam to drive traffic to Web sites run by third parties. The FTC alleged that in an attempt to conceal the source of the spam, the spammer routed his promotions for pharmaceuticals and adult content through unwitting consumers’ computers. The FTC charged Brian McMullen, doing business as BM Entertainment and B Pimp, with violating the CAN-SPAM Act. The settlement bars future violations and imposes a judgment of $24,193, which is suspended based on his inability to pay. In addition, the defendant has pleaded guilty to criminal charges related to spam and unauthorized possession of access devices – credit cards. He currently is awaiting sentencing.

Posted under Privacy

In a survey to test whether top e-tailers are allowing consumers to opt out of receiving promotional or marketing messages, the FTC has determined that 89 percent of the online merchants it tested are honoring requests to halt future mailings.

The CAN-SPAM Act, which became effective January 1, 2004, requires that senders of commercial e-mail provide recipients with a clear and conspicuous notice that they have the right to opt out of receiving future marketing messages, provide a mechanism to allow them to exercise that right, and honor requests to be removed from future mailings.

To assess whether e-tailers were complying with the opt-out provisions of the CAN-SPAM Act, FTC staff developed a list of 100 top e-tailers – those who make significant use of the Internet to market their goods or services – and visited their sites. Most of the sites solicited consumers to sign up for special offers, promotions, updates and newsletters via e-mail. FTC staff created three new e-mail accounts and opted in to receive the offers and promotions once for each of the three e-mail accounts and monitored the accounts for six weeks. Then staff notified the e-tailers they wished to stop receiving commercial e-mail messages.

The study showed a high rate of compliance with the CAN-SPAM opt-out provisions. All of the e-tailers who sent e-mail to the FTC accounts provided clear notice of recipients’ right to opt out of receiving future mail and provided recipients with an opt-out mechanism. Eighty nine percent of the e-tailers honored all three of the opt-out requests made by FTC staff and 93 percent complied with opt-out requests for at least some accounts.

Posted under Privacy