As spam continues to flood consumers’ e-mail inboxes, more states are fighting back on their behalf. So far this year, 16 states have enacted new anti-spam laws out of about 30 states that have introduced legislation to curb unsolicited commercial and other forms of bulk e-mail. That brings the number of states with anti-spam laws to 35, says Pam Greenberg, program manager for the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Although each state devised its legislation independently, the new laws generally address similar issues related to the tendency of spam to carry misleading messages from unclearly identified senders, she adds. “The laws generally prohibit misrepresenting or falsifying the origin of or the routing of information on messages, using a third party’s Internet address without permission, or including misleading information in the subject line of a message,” the NCLS says.
In addition, the laws generally require e-mail marketing messages to carry contact information, such as a toll-free telephone number or a valid e-mail address that recipients can use to opt out of receiving future messages. And they require labeling, such as “ADV” or “ADVST” in the subject line of an e-mail message to indicate whether the message carries a commercial advertisement; messages intended only for adults generally must carry a more specific label, such as “ADV:ADLT.”
Critics of state efforts to enact anti-spam laws have called for a federal law with stiff financial penalties to assure nationwide compliance. One inherent weakness of having individual state laws on labeling, for instance, could lead to consumers setting up filters to block all legitimate advertisers who use “ADV” or “ADVST” in their subject line, while letting in spammers who don’t use the labels.
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