Anti Spam Policy
The CAN-Spam Act introduced in the year 2003, and effective
from January 1, 2004. Details of the bill are available
here.
The Act is intended to stem the tide of spam, formally
known as unsolicited commercial email, which currently
floods personal and business email inboxes. Unfortunately
the Act takes the opt-out approach, allowing transmission
of unsolicited mail until the recipient asks for the mailings
to cease. This may actually cause an increase in unsolicited
mailing, as stricter State laws that prohibit opt-out
email marketing, such as California’s recently passed
law, will be preempted by the new national law.
Nevertheless, the CAN-Spam Act contains requirements
that must be met by all mailers regardless of existence
of a prior business relationship with the recipient.
All companies that send commercial email must:
- Do Not use subject headings intended to mislead the
recipient into opening the message.
- Use a reply address that will be active for at least
thirty days following the transmission of an email message.
- Include a physical postal address in the body of each
message.
- Include a clear notice that the message being sent is
an advertisement or solicitation.
- Include clear instructions in the body of the message
detailing how to opt-out of subsequent mailings
- Honor all opt-out requests within ten days and not transfer,
sell, lease, or exchange the email address of any recipient
that has made an opt-out request.
All of the above apply to both solicited and unsolicited
commercial mailings with one exception. Mail sent to
recipients at their consent (opt-in newsletters, alerts,
etc…) does not need to contain the disclaimer
labeling the message as an advertisement or solicitation.
Damages under this Act can be reduced if policies and
procedures designed to prevent such violations have
been established and implemented, and a violation occurred
despite reasonable effort intended to maintain compliance
with the aforementioned policies.
Since most legitimate email marketers honor removal
requests and do not send mailings by hijacking open
relay servers or write misleading subject lines, the
two key issues to address before the New Year are the
inclusion of a physical postal address in the message,
and the inclusion of a disclaimer identifying the message
as a solicitation or advertisement, should one be required.
|
