EU Rolls out Anti Spam Strategy

An anonymous reader was one of several who noted an article about the latest developments in the EUs War on Spam. The article is pretty realistic in pointing out that EU Legislation won't be very effective unless Asia and the US do something as well.

Comments

Hrmm

[acehole]

With all the laws, bans and implementations of anti-spam measures, I'm curious to know if there is any reduction in the amount of overall spam?

Are we fighting a losing battle? or have the tides turned against the spammers?

too late

[u-238]

Sigh..

before this thing is even PROPOSED, spammers have already implimented a method to deter this

http://www.symantec.com/spamwatch/

they've spread trojan viruses to moron AOL users who's PCs act as proxies thru which spammers safely and anonymously continue their work

Money

[cspenn]

It's all about money. Until legislators and the rest of the folks who run systems that understand this, spam will not stop. Spam is a cost effective, if obnoxious, solution for advertising. Even if spam is illegal, unless the entire planet decides to take unified action, spam will not stop - it'll just relocate to places without extradition treaties. You'll end up having to blackhole entire countries to staunch it.

How many people and how many euros is the EU willing to pony up to enforce these laws? Probably about the same amount that the United States ponies up for speed limit enforcement. 55 MPH is the law, not the reality...

Chris
www.studint.com

International Computing Organization

[dlosey]

While reading about Iraqis being trained in Linux, I saw that the United Nations supports Linux and its worldwide expansion. It got me thinking (always a bad thing for a /. reader), why can't we have an international group of policy makers for the computing world? They could be created by the UN and eventually form a separate organization which regulates such things as email, domain names, and spam. Sort of like ICANN, but more law enforcement based.

Maybe its just a pipe dream, but a nice thought anyways.

Well it goes something like this...

[Kjella]

EU thinks "no point, we need the US and Asia"
US thinks "no point, we need the EU and Asia"
Asia thinks "no point, we need the EU and US"

Laws have to start somewhere, and I'm sure there's a reason why all my spam is carpetbombed US crap. I'm pretty sure it's the local laws that are the cause that I have only recieved *one* spam mail in my local language, from a national company, ever. And I sent them a reply stating that next time I would file charges, and I've never heard from them again.

We need a new mail protocol, with proper digital signing and verification of authorithy (does 231.143.211.35 have permission to send mail using the domain name "hotmail.com"?) as well as integrated feedback possibilities both to mail servers, and if possible, to those administratively responsible for a given netblock (e.g. ISP) as well. If spam was more tracable, it would be a lot easier to shut down and blacklist.

Kjella

Wrong!

[www.sorehands.com]

If spam is illegal, and someone uses "affiliates" that spam to promote their pills, the seller is still responsible for their agents.

Even if the person is using a ralksy to send spam from servers in China, the person hiring the ralksy is still liable.

At some point, if the product originates or the money goes through the country that's laws have been violates, you may be able to get it.