Senate Attacks Spam

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Two U.S. senators have reintroduced antispam legislation that could impose fines of up to $10 per e-mail message on spammers who refuse to stop sending their unwanted missives.

The Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act--CAN-SPAM for short--would require senders of unsolicited e-mail to include workable return e-mail addresses to which recipients can write to opt out of further mailings. If the spammer keeps sending unsolicited e-mail to recipients who opt out, the sender could be fined $10 per e-mail, up to $500,000. Courts finding spammers who "willingly and knowingly" violated the law could impose fines of up to $1.5 million.

The bill also imposes a criminal penalty of up to a year in jail for spammers who include misleading header information in unsolicited commercial e-mail messages.

Domestic Battle

Senators Conrad Burns (R-Montana) and Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) reintroduced the bill Thursday. This version of CAN-SPAM is similar to versions introduced during the last two sessions of Congress. Last year the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee unanimously approved the bill, but it failed to get to the full Senate floor for debate.

A spokesperson for Burns says she is unsure when a hearing on the bill will happen this year.

She also admits that the bill can do little to stem the tide of spam from senders outside the United States, but says it will ultimately reduce the spam from U.S. sources. "Overseas, it's really hard to control that," she adds. "But this will definitely keep the numbers down, that's the point."

Free-speech advocates such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation have opposed some antispam legislation because of fears it would limit e-mail users' opportunity to communicate. Wendy Seltzer, an EFF staff attorney, says the CAN-SPAM bill sounds less aggressive than some past bills, but she still questions whether it allows people to communicate anonymously through e-mail.

"That's something we want to protect as well," she says.

Seltzer also questions whether the bill would have much enforcement action behind it. "It's not as if this is going to go in and break things," she says of the bill. "But it sounds an awful lot like a Band-Aid measure."

ISPs Endorse Bill

Burns, in a statement, says an estimated 40 percent of e-mail in the United States is spam, causing a loss of more than $10 billion a year.

"The costs are enormous for people paying long-distance charges for their Internet time," Burns says in the statement. "This is unfair to consumers and something needs to be done."

Wyden, in a statement, says the bill would continue to allow legitimate e-commerce messages.

"Just as quickly as the use of e-mail has spread, its usefulness could dwindle--buried under an avalanche of 'get rich quick,' 'lose weight fast,' and pornographic marketing pitches," Wyden says in the statement. "This bill will help to keep legitimate Internet traffic and e-commerce flowing by going after those unscrupulous individuals who use e-mail in annoying and misleading ways."

America Online has issued a statement in support of the CAN-SPAM bill, and Burns says the bill also has support from Yahoo and EBay.

"We will continue to work together with other ISPs and policymakers to ensure that spam legislation has 'real teeth,' and provides the weapons needed to enable and empower AOL and other ISPs to pursue the most egregious and offensive spam violators--those who continue their daily spam attacks using the most fraudulent and evasive methods," the AOL statement reads in part.